


Stranger Things

by beadslut, jenna_thorn



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, NCIS
Genre: Crossover, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-10-07
Updated: 2009-10-07
Packaged: 2017-10-20 19:04:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 36,284
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/216126
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beadslut/pseuds/beadslut, https://archiveofourown.org/users/jenna_thorn/pseuds/jenna_thorn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Some time ago, <span><a href="http://jenna-thorn.dreamwidth.org/profile"><img/></a><a href="http://jenna-thorn.dreamwidth.org/"><b>jenna_thorn</b></a></span> and I were tossing around a virtual football of ideas that turned into this story, <i>Stranger Things</i>, a crossover between J.K. Rowling's universe, and NCIS.  When we had told all the story we had to tell, the opportunity to submit the piece to the Hermione Big Bang came up, and we did that.  Of course, that meant polishing and finishing and the hell of dialog tags and transitions and the actual heart-stopping moment of hitting "send".  It was a learning experience, a labor of love, and the opportunity to meet the other half of my brain.  I would never have finished this alone, would have thrown up my hands in disgust and thrown it in the bottom drawer with the other unfinished projects.  Thank you, my beautiful enabler, for poking and prodding me.  Most of all, thank you for putting up with me, and being the best writing partner I can imagine having.</p><p>In the course of participation, we had the incredible luck to have some really awesome art created for our story.  I would like to publicly thank <span><a href="http://www.dreamwidth.org/profile?user=tbranch"><img/></a><a href="http://www.dreamwidth.org/profile?user=tbranch"><b>tbranch</b></a></span>, <span><a href="http://mamabasto.dreamwidth.org/profile"><img/></a><a href="http://mamabasto.dreamwidth.org/"><b>mamabasto</b></a></span>  and <span><a href="http://www.dreamwidth.org/profile?user=goodsally"><img/></a><a href="http://www.dreamwidth.org/profile?user=goodsally"><b>goodsally</b></a></span>, and *squee* all over again about the pretty they made.</p><p>Of course our betas were instrumental in helping wrangle the story into readable form.  I am so grateful for your help.</p></blockquote>





	Stranger Things

Patrolman Miller looked down at the pair of feet poking out from under the juniper in the parkway. Drunk in the middle of the afternoon, he thought as he kicked at the bottom of the feet. "Come on, buddy. You can sleep it off at the station, not here." He got no response, and bent to look more closely. The man under the bush wasn't dead drunk, just dead. His throat was torn, life's blood soaked into the ground, his eyes wide in terror. Miller checked in vain for a pulse, keying his radio to call it in.  
\---:::---

Tim McGee stared at the map on his screen with its cluster of red dots and thought for a moment that it would be nice to go back to days of big paper maps on a corkboard. Then he could throw the red pins at Tony.

"No, what I'm telling --." Tony threw another paperclip at him. It bounced off his shoulder and skidded across his keyboard. "Stop that! What I'm telling you is that Gibb's neurosis aside, shared locations aren't a connection, that's coinc-"

Tony interrupted him, "Just don't say it. Don't say the word."

Rolling his eyes, Tim persisted. "These connections aren't valid. Yes, several have frequented the same bar, but they are all Marines, all stationed within a forty mile radius. The so-called common element is that there are only so many places to blow a jarhead's paycheck in town."

Ziva mused, "Even if the locale is a red heron, there are too many connecting factors. Ten Marines missing, and two dead, plus one recently retired who may or may not be related, as he may or may not have gone fishing without his cell phone. No spouses, no nearby relatives. These men are being selected."

"So why are some of them left dead and others missing, possibly abducted??" Tim asked his monitor. It couldn't be less informative than Tony.

Flipping another paperclip in the air, Tony offered, "Maybe we just haven't found the others yet."

"The ones we have found haven't exactly been hidden. There is no reason to conceal some but not all," responded Ziva

"Hey!" shouted Tony, and grinned. Tim didn't bother to mask his dismay. He'd hoped to go the entire morning without a movie reference. "It's the Island of Dr. Moreau!" Tony hunched over in his chair and intoned, "What is the law?"

Tim threw a paperclip back, and said, "No."

Without bothering to duck, Tony grinned again. "Perhaps they went well with some fava beans and a nice chianti?"

Tim sighed. "Tony, please, you aren't helping."

"Ah, no, I've got it." Tony dropped the paperclip onto his desk.

"No, you don't." Tim tapped the pencil against his desk. It kept him from throwing it after the paperclip.

"Werewolf!" Tony declared.

Tim threw his pencil on the desk. Clearly it was time to humor Tony, as he'd get jackshit done otherwise. "Werewolf?"

Tony grinned again, the _gotcha_ grin that Tim particularly disliked. "There wolf. There geek," and he laughed at his own joke. The search box popped up on Tim's monitor and he tuned Tony out entirely for the two and a half minutes it took for Tony to veer through horror cinema classics and the decline of scary movies since Ed Wood. By the time Tim set up the new search parameters on the dead Marine, Tony was arguing both sides of a discussion that no one else cared about. "Landon is a classic. You can see who the monsters really are and it's not him. Fox is all wannabe, played for laughs."

"It is funny, though," Ziva said. "And the moon nearly full."

Tim wondered aloud, "Was it Landon who did the later ones, the ones that wound up being inadvertently funny? How many were there, total?"

"That wasn't Landon, probie. He only did 'I was a Teenage Werewolf'. You are thinking of Lon Chaney."

"Ziva, check him on IMDB." Tim leaned back and grinned. "DiNozzo versus the Internet."

Tony seemed surprised. "You've discovered the timesuck that is IMDB?"

"With you, diNozzo, once I found it, I bookmarked it," Ziva said, but she fell silent and they all looked up in unison as Gibbs rounded the corner.

"Then close the book," said Gibbs. "We have another dead Marine, same MO."

\---:::---

No matter how unseasonably warm it was, December still meant the sun went down early, and the shadows were lengthening when they arrived at the crime scene. Too many people were looking, too many potential suspects, too much curiosity. Gibbs hated crime scenes with an audience. There wasn't much he could do about it, since the crime had occurred in a public park, but he hated it anyway. Gawkers milled in the parking lot, their nightly jog or dog walk around the lake postponed for something out of the ordinary.

"Boss, there's some interesting looking people in the crowd," offered DiNozzo.

"Yeah, I see 'em. Two at five o'clock; they look like they're wearing capes," said Gibbs.

"There's a couple of others in the crowd, keep looking at each other. The guy in the red hoodie moves like a shoplifter. Watching to see if he's being watched. The caped crusaders stand like cops," DiNozzo added.

"Keep an eye on them, DiNozzo."

"The Ren Faire people or the nervous ones?"

"DiNozzo, am I asking too much of you to keep track of the crowd?" asked Gbbs.

"No boss, on it."

Gibbs bent down to talk to his medical examiner. "Anything?"

"No sign of a weapon. Jethro, this tearing appears to have been done by an animal."

"What kind of animal, Ducky?"

"A very large one, I'd say. Abby should be able to assist us with that."

"Get him back to the lab; there are some folks out here I'd like to keep an eye on."

Ducky nodded and raised his voice, "Mr. Palmer?"

"I'll get the gurney, Dr. Mallard," responded his assistant.

In short order the van was loaded, Ducky and Palmer aboard, and Gibbs slapped its side to send it into the sunset. He was always happier when his medical people were safely out of a situation that could turn dangerous. He nodded at DiNozzo and McGee, and watched them start towards the nervous onlookers DiNozzo had pointed out earlier.

"Miller, with me. Hand on your weapon."

Patrolman Miller swallowed hard but fell in behind him. Gibbs sauntered in the direction of the caped pair, grimacing at the fading light. DiNozzo was right; they stood like cops who had seen service in some military organization. The smaller of the two met his eyes the entire way. He was not quite six feet tall, with dark blond hair. His companion was taller, powerfully built, his dark hair a mass of curls. He was holding something, like a long pencil, or a stick. They should have looked anachronistic, but they wore the cloaks like everyday clothing. "Not exactly your jurisdiction, gentlemen."

The blond grinned and reached into a pocket carefully and unthreateningly. He opened a leather folder, and Gibbs looked at him skeptically. "I don't recognize the badge."

"I'd be surprised if you had," the blond offered. "I'm Dick Sheppard. My colleague, Padraig Bard. We represent an agency you're likely unfamiliar with." His voice was rough; Gibbs placed his accent as English, from the north of the country, possibly Yorkshire.

"Well, I'd like to become familiar with it. I'd like to know what it is you're doing at my crime scene and," he looked pointedly at Bard, "if you don't put that twig away, you'll be using it for a toothpick."

Bard looked at Sheppard before complying. Good to know who was wing and who was in charge. They both looked over his left shoulder and Gibbs refused to fall for it, but then heard McGee shout, "Ziva, Tony! Got a runner!" He spun to check his team, noting that Bard shook his sleeve to put the stick in his hand again and Sheppard pulled a gadget out of his pocket that was straight from Journey to the Center of the Earth.

Three perps were moving, split into two and one. Ziva and McGee were pounding after the two, so Gibbs followed the other one.

Sheppard and Bard matched him step for step, pushing through the gawkers to the edge of the crowd where Gibbs ducked toward the open space near the water's edge and the others took off toward the picnic pavilions. "Miller, DiNozzo," shouted Gibbs, "secure the scene!"

\--:::---

Tim and Ziva sprinted after the guy in the red sweatshirt; his companion had faded into the trees.

"At least the moon is nearly full," Ziva called cheerfully, as though she were strolling through a mall.

"Working streetlights," Tim panted, "would be better."

Ziva veered left, after the second suspect. Tim raced down the path, most of his attention on the runner in the red sweatshirt, some spared for not sprawling face down on the unfamiliar terrain in the shifting shadows of early evening.

Another shape appeared to the left in the corner of his eye, skirting the warming house. It easily kept pace with him. His peripheral vision told him it was another man by his gait, and Tim spared a moment to wonder if Gibbs had lost the other suspect and was pacing him. Ziva had to be ahead.

Tim called, "NCIS Agent! Stop right now or I will shoot."

The first runner stopped about thirty yards away and turned towards Tim. He seemed to gather himself up, and Tim could have sworn he heard growling from two sides.

The suspect leaped. It wasn't a jump. His back legs uncoiled from an impossible crouch that human legs could not duplicate. Tim thought he might be losing his mind. The runner's mouth was suddenly elongated and filled with more sharp teeth than Tim wanted to see any closer. He fired, and a third figure appeared on his right, pointing at the thing in front of him.

Silver flashed on her wrists as she shouted something in a foreign language, maybe Italian, in a firm, feminine voice. She stood twenty feet to his right, safe. He shot again. As he fired, he heard a pop, and the woman stood in the path of his round, between him and the creature. She hissed in pain and hit the ground. He had never seen her move.

"Stay down!" he shouted, and shot a third time, over her, directly into the creature's torso. The shreds of a red shirt fell as it backed away across the clearing, looking for all the world like a dog-man hybrid. The woman shouted again, pointing at the thing he'd shot.  
McGee heard growling on his left. Oh god, the other guy is another one, he thought, not very coherently. He kept his gun trained on the creature in front of him, hoping Gibbs, Ziva, anyone had his back. Then his…man?...twitched. Before he could shout or shoot, something smashed into his left side with enough force that it all but knocked his gun from his grasp.

Hair pressed into the side of his face and neck. McGee twisted away, and something closed on his shoulder. An instant later, a dozen sharp pains flashed through him. He felt his flesh tear. Desperately, he clutched at his weapon, pressing it into his attacker's gut. As the creature forced him back against the wall of the groundskeeper's shack, McGee fired off four shots in quick succession.

The woman he'd shot was on her feet again. "Sectumsempra!" she cried. The thing on him yelped and sprang up onto the roof. Tim heard claws scrabble on the tin of the shed.

The first creature shook itself. As the woman's gaze shifted to McGee, it ran towards her. McGee raised his gun.

"Stand still and drop your weapons, all of you!" he shouted automatically. He wondered, slightly hysterically, if the monster in front of him could drop its teeth, and if the two rounds he had left would make a difference.

Two shots came out of the woods, striking the creature's body. A slight second behind came a perfect head shot that Tim knew no one could have made in those conditions except Ziva. The creature dropped and didn't move again.

The woman raised her hands in the air, her left arm shaking and dripping blood. The second creature, the one that had mauled him, had vanished.

It had all taken less than a minute.

Tim ejected the empty clip, hand trembling, as he inserted a full one from his pocket, a motion that Ziva had drilled him on over and over. He glanced at his left shoulder and swallowed hard. His Armani jacket was a ruin, bright blood running freely over it. He wondered if he could claim it on expenses. Keeping his gun trained on the woman he had shot, he walked unsteadily towards her.

"Who are you?" he asked. He committed her to memory, for his report, or so he told himself. Somehow "medium height, with curly brown hair, brown eyes" didn't do her justice. She wore a cream sweater, jeans and low-heeled hiking boots. The left sleeve was rent, stained crimson, and McGee could see blood still welling from what looked like a graze on her bicep.

"Hermione Granger. I am so sorry," she said, gesturing to his wound. "I didn't see the second one until he was already on you." She cocked her head at the sound of approaching sirens, then glanced down at her bloody arm with a wince. "I believe that ambulance is for us.” She nodded at his weapon. “I mean you no harm."

The ambulance pulled into the clearing. McGee holstered his sidearm to escort her over to it. Gibbs was waiting, looking pissed off and not in any way winded. McGee sighed. He knew better than to apologize. His arm was cold, and he was beginning to shake.

Gibbs said, "Sit down. Try not to bleed on one another." He flipped his phone open to call Ducky back to the new crime scene. Tim obediently sat, only to stand upright again and fish the cuffs out of his pocket with the wrong hand, self conscious about his awkwardness. He tossed the cuffs down with a clatter, and then sat down more carefully next to Granger. He glanced over, and she met his gaze with deep worry in her eyes.  
The paramedics ignored them, working silently as they cut open Tim's shirt and jacket. The pain from their jostling made him grind his jaw. The EMT yammered on about it being a clean wound, how it had missed anything important. Tim was sure he'd be more grateful later about his carotid artery and undamaged nerves but for the moment, it hurt like hell and he really wanted the guy to quit moving his arm up and down. There was a lot of blood for the medic to be calling it a minor wound and besides, why weren't they poking and prodding at the gunshot wound sitting next to him?

As if on cue, the second EMT grunted. "You were lucky, miss. I thought you two were a matched set, but it's just a graze." He packed up his kit. "I'll get you something to drink. Gotta stay hydrated."

Tim noticed with disappointment that the woman had her sweater on again, and that it was no longer stained with gore. That train of thought derailed when the EMT pulled free the gauze he'd been using to apply direct pressure. The rip stung at the skin level, but something else, bone deep, twisted and flared.

He hissed through his teeth and the woman reached out to pat the hand on his uninjured arm.

She asked, "Am I under arrest?"

He sighed, "Not exactly. Are you going to press charges?"

"Press charges? Why would I?"

"I shot you." Tim said.

"Not precisely."

"You walked into my shot."

"No. Not in the slightest."

He studied her, decided some answers could wait, and took a different tack. "You're not from around here, are you?"

"England, actually."

"I need to get some more tape," interrupted the EMT. "Don't go anywhere."

McGee nodded. Granger reached into her jeans pocket, pulled out a handkerchief, and picked up the bandage that the EMT had discarded, the gauze soaked with blood from McGee's wound. He asked, "What are you planning on doing with that?".

"It's a long story," she said as she folded it carefully, blood on top.

"Knowing my boss, we have lots of time. Go ahead and start."

"Well, this,” she gestured “is silk. It’s an insulator. What do you know about werewolves?" she asked.

Tim laughed. Tony would love this one. In fact, if the situation hadn't been so dire, Tim would have been sure Tony'd put her up to it. As it was…no, he wasn't going to believe seven impossible things before breakfast either. He didn't know what it was that Ziva's shot had dropped, but no. "I'm not much into horror movies." The back of his neck, where the thing that had bitten him had rubbed, tingled. He shook his head; werewolves weren't real.

She smiled without humor. "Is anyone watching?"

Curious, he decided to play along. He leaned forward to see past the open doors and deliberately looked to the left, then the right, "No."

When he sat back again, with a wince, she was holding a stick. It was carved with vines and looked somehow right in her hand. She tapped it confidently against the bloody pad and murmured something he didn't catch. The blood pulled up into tiny lifelike figures, a homunculus and a wolf, that then turned into what looked for all the world like the Furbolg that had joined his WoW party last night.

"Blast, bugger all, and damn," she said. Her brown eyes held grief now.

"How'd you do that?" He wanted to poke at the gauze, to take it to Abby and have her make sense of it.

"Magic. I'm a witch. That's not what we need to talk about first. We do need to talk about Werewolves."

The memory of the scrape of rough fur against his neck made him shudder. He said, "Don't exist."

"Neither does magic." She slid her wand into her sleeve and the tiny red figures sank back into the gauze as blood again. "Let's start again, shall we? My name is Hermione Granger, and I never told you any of those things."

"NCIS Agent Timothy McGee, Ms. Granger."

"It's Miss, Agent."

Both of them were silent for a moment, framing questions for one another. He started, "You didn't seem surprised at those... creatures."

Her expression darkened. "I have dealt with them before. In fact, I was investigating them when all this," she gestured to encompass the area, "happened. Now you've been bitten and infected, and it's all my fault."

Tim looked at her, speechless.

The second paramedic reappeared with two bottles as Gibbs approached them. He handed the woman the clear one, and a darker beverage to Tim, saying, "Need to stay hydrated."

"Don't drink that, Agent McGee." She took the bottle from him and sniffed at it. "Polyjuice or illusion, Auror? Finite."

The air shimmered and before them stood a cloaked man with an angry expression.

"It's for his own good, and your safety, Miss Granger."

Granger nodded gravely and introduced them as formally as a dowager in Pride and Prejudice, "Agent Timothy McGee, this is Auror Sheppard, who is trying to poison you with Wolfsbane."

McGee added two and two and came up with fish. Twice.

Granger was murmuring over the clear bottle. After a moment, she sniffed and nodded. "This one's safe." She passed the Aquafina to Tim who took a long pull automatically. Gibbs was joined by Tony and Ziva, who bracketed the newcomer.

Gibbs' hand came down heavily on Sheppard's shoulder who responded with a glare. "We've met." Gibbs said.

Sheppard shook off Gibbs' hand, and he glared with overt anger at Granger. "Not here," he said to Gibbs.

Gibbs took the cuffs out of his back pocket and answered, "You don't get to choose where we talk." He ducked his head at Tim. "Stay here, I'll be back in a minute."

They were only a few steps away, when Granger leaned in toward him and whispered, ""Tim, look at me. I've got to go, but you need to know this. Werewolves can be monsters or they can be victims. I can save a victim, but only if you give me time to. Resist the Ministry."

The EMT stepped back around the corner, looking over his shoulder. Granger stood up, pointed her stick at the EMT and said, "Obscurem tempus."

Tim said, "Ministry of what?"  
The EMT said, "Who?" then tapped Granger on the shoulder. "I'm sorry, miss, but you'll have to move."

"Oh! Certainly, excuse me," Granger said as Tim gaped and wondered how much blood he'd lost.

"Should I feel dizzy?" he asked, and the EMT passed him a bottle of water, not noticing the half full one still in Tim's hand. He leaned against the open ambulance door then jumped as Gibbs tapped the window near his ear. Gibbs waited as the EMT returned and finished wrapping Tim's shoulder. He ran a finger along the cut section of his shirt and undershirt and sighed. The EMT wadded up Tim's leather, and tossed it in the trash.

Gibbs threw an NCIS jacket to him and asked the EMT, "Where's the civilian?"

"Civilian?

"The woman, gunshot to the shoulder."

"Uh, I'm not ... What woman?"

Gibbs turned to Tim, who shook his head. He'd explain later; right now, he wanted to hear what the EMTs would say.

The EMTs looked at one another, then at Gibbs. "We didn't treat a gunshot wound, sir. Just your agent with the shoulder wound. Sir."

Gibbs spun on his heel and headed back to the van, before Tim could wave him down. This was the trouble, he thought, with going with his gut instinct. It always seemed reasonable at the time but never in hindsight.

\---::: ---

Ziva returned to the office and pulled up Word to write the report before bothering to open the actual report program. This one would require a first and probably a second draft. She typed in times and observations and thought about the impossibly hairy man-shape that had flown by her with wolf's teeth and how it hadn't looked or felt like the half dressed man bleeding out onto the ground with her bullet in his brain.

DiNozzo was teasing McGee about shooting, or possibly not shooting, a civilian, driving the joke as far as he could, and McGee was rubbing his injured shoulder, carefully avoiding the gauze. Ziva tapped in the closing signature on the scene report, saved, submitted, and flipped back over to Word to clear her rough draft. She minimized the window and started when the IMDB.com page she'd forgotten she had open underneath it popped up. Michael Landon in a fur suit gazed worriedly out of the monitor at her. DiNozzo had moved on to making man bites dog jokes to the back of McGee's head. It wasn't a dog, Ziva thought. She wasn't entirely sure what it had been, but it wasn't a dog.

DiNozzo announced to the room in general that he was headed to the break room for MilkBone biscuits and did anyone want any? She waved him off with one hand, not looking up. She considered pulling up Google, but what would she do? An internet search on werewolves wouldn't explain what she knew she had seen. She closed down Explorer and glanced up to check on McGee, but he'd wandered off as well. Standing at the edge of the stairway, peering around worriedly, was a striking woman who had been undoubtedly more than classically beautiful twenty years before.

"May I help you?" Ziva asked, looking around. No one was allowed past reception without an escort or a badge, and she saw neither as the woman smiled broadly and stepped closer.

"I am Cygnet Safire, of... ahem ... of the Royal Hospital in London. I do have documents, um, here." The woman pulled out a sheaf of papers, some handwritten, and waved them vaguely at Ziva.

Ziva smiled to be civil and did not take the offered papers. "Have you signed in?"

"Oh yes, yes, I just got a bit turned around on the way. I'm trying to find the morgue. You had a young man brought in, you see, and I need, I need to examine him."

"Of course. If you'll follow me, I'll take you back to reception and they can call Dr. Mallard for you from there."

"Oh, that won't be necessary, really, I can ..."

"No, ma'am," Ziva smoothly interrupted. "I must insist."

The woman, Safire, acquiesced, "Then thank you, I would appreciate the help. I'm afraid I'm a bit befuddled by all this."

Ziva walked her to the nearest security station and instructed the uniform there to escort Dr. Safire to reception and nowhere else. She returned to her own desk as Gibbs stalked into the office area and put his weapon into his desk with the exaggerated care that usually meant he wanted to throw it. His guest from the crime scene wasn't with him and Ziva weighed the merits of asking versus not having to know. She decided not to ask.

When she looked away, she saw Director Vance coming down the hall, along with a lanky man in a sheepskin coat. What bad timing he has, she thought, and turned her attention to Vance's companion. Ziva noted he was not quite six feet tall, that his green eyes were sad, and his straight, shoulder length blond hair wouldn't pass regulation in any agency she knew of. He was also armed with an old and well used Colt. Vance nodded to her before saying to Gibbs, "Agent Gibbs, this is Franklin Calder. He's requesting that we liaise with some of Her Majesty's finest. Full disclosure."

Eyebrow raised, Gibbs asked, "MI6?"

"Not exactly," Calder said. "They are a… special unit. Two men. Sheppard and Bard ."

The muscle in Gibb's cheek twitched. Ziva decided she really didn't want to know why Gibbs had left the scene with a man in cuffs but had walked into HQ alone and angry. Gibbs, leaned on his desk and shook his head. "Full disclosure, Sheppard, and Bard. Does this disclosure run both ways?"

The look Vance gave him was amused. "No, per 10 Downing and before you ask, yes, the White House has given consent directly. SecNav's no happier about it than you are. They started at the top."

"I'm sorry, Agent Gibbs. This is not something you're equipped to deal with," drawled Calder. He was decidedly not British.

Vance answered, "I'll show you to the door," and gave the smile that no one who'd seen him actually smile could ever think was real.

Ziva dawdled over closing her computer while Gibbs said four words she couldn't catch into his desk phone, then slammed the handset down. He grabbed up a file and played with it. "I sent McGee and DiNozzo home. Why are you here?"

"Just wondering who our guests are," Ziva answered.

"Aren't we all. Apparently, special agents to the Crown: Aurors Sheppard and Bard, both of whom have already interfered in an operation where one of my people was injured, are going to be gracing us with their presence in the morning," Gibbs snarled. Vance came back around the corner, speaking into his cell phone. Gibbs acknowledged his return by finishing in a slightly more civil tone, "We are to offer our full co-operation."

Ziva asked, "What about Dr. Safire?" Vance and Gibbs looked at one another then to her. Ziva continued, "She said she was here to consult with Ducky about the body from the park."

Vance interrupted, "Which one?"

"I didn't volunteer that we had two, " she answered. Gibbs didn't actually smile, but she could see the corner of his mouth curl.

Gibbs said, "You sent her back up to the desk?" and at her nod, he continued toward Vance, "Good. I'll go talk to Ducky. There's something else going on here." He looked in the direction of Calder's departure. "What agency did he say he was with?

Vance waved his cell phone. “FBI. Not," he correctly interpreted Ziva's fish mouth, "that FBI. Fantastical Beasts Institute."

"I've never heard of any special agent called auror, or any other FBI." muttered Gibbs, and stalked out of the bullpen.

“Where are we going, Gibbs?” Ziva grabbed her sweater and rose.

“You," he answered, "are going home for the night. I am going downstairs to offer my assistance to your Doctor Safire and Ducky, and to cooperate fully with the Institute of whatever-the-hell-it-was, just like I was ordered.”

Vance said to the closing elevator door, "Because we all know how well you respond to orders."

\--:::---

Ducky turned to face the body of the young unfortunate they'd brought in and was surprised to see a woman, perhaps his own age, standing in the doorway. She stepped into the room, her eyes wide as she looked around the room.

Ducky pulled down his mask to speak clearly, "Madam, I am afraid you've lost your way. This is a restricted area."

She looked at Ducky with confused semi-recognition. "Oh no, I'm right where I should be, all perfectly acceptable; here's my identification. Dr. Cygnet Safire, from England. You are Dr. Mallard? Would it be indelicate to ask when you left our common home?"

"I’ve been here long enough to consider America my home, Dr Safire, but I came here as an adult. Were you perhaps in the service?"

Safire laughed. "Not the Mu-the military, no. You just seem so very familiar to me. Something about your eyes, perhaps."

"I’ve been told I have my mother’s eyes, actually. I'm sorry. I didn't see your visitor's badge."

"A bit of that going around. Undoubtedly a simple family resemblance then…we all have cousins."

"I have very few actually, although we do still have family in Scotland, on my mother's side. The McCalllums."

She huffed out a laugh, "I walk under a portrait of your Uncle Bernard when I get my tea."

"My Uncle Bernard? You must be mistaken. I have an Uncle Bernard, but he left to go away to school and then joined the foreign service. Went quite mad in India, I understand. There wouldn't be a portrait of old Uncle Bernard."

"Nonsense, very well respected, your uncle is, in my line of work, very good doctor. I still consult with him."

"Ah, then you must be mistaken. He wasn’t a doctor, and he’s quite dead by now."

Safire seemed flustered as she said, "I consult the notes he left behind, of course. And there are branches of science that don’t make your headlines, Dr. Mallard. Now let’s see to this poor young man, shall we?"

"You are a guest in my morgue, madam; I’ll ask you to step away."

"Ah yes, of course, merely here to observe, I am. Might I borrow, erm, a mask?"

Mallard made the Y incision carefully, moving slowly, intent on the woman behind him. But the stomach contents were gruesome and he forgot about her as he weighed and sifted and pulled out human phalanges and bits of drab ripstop nylon, most likely general issue. Her voice came as a bit of a surprise then, as she said, "Ah, oh dear. Could you check his ankles for abnormal growth patterns next, please?" But he did so. Next, again at her suggestion, he examined the young man's wrists and jawline finding what was absolutely not a human shape for an ocularis maxilla. He pulled the fellow's lip back from his elongated canines and sighed.

Finally, Mallard set down the scalpel and turned to face his visitor."Dr. Safire, I do believe that you are carefully not telling me something."

She pursed her lips, irritated. "Given how badly I've hidden anything that I should be keeping mum about, I don't know that there's anything worth telling that I've not told."

"Perhaps you could clarify then, how this man has dewclaws."

"Not enough rain?"

"I find myself growing impatient," Ducky said.

"Ah, this, this is why I stay at home. That and the ready availability of floo-enabled chimneys. Right then, what do you know of magic?"

"Magic? you mean sleight of hand."

"No, Dr. Mallard, I mean Magic, with a capital M. Not stage work but an entire world that lives alongside yours, a half step in the shadows. I mean a world populated with witches and wizards, where wands work and potions heal, and yes, a world in which werewolves kill one another."

"Werewolves."

"Yes," she said, and nodded, seemingly pleased.

"Magic," he restated and wondered how quickly he could reach the alarm.

"Oh, do try to keep up, Dr. Mallard. We'd moved on past Magic in general to werewolves in specific."

The door whished open and Gibbs strode through. Ducky looked up, slightly manic. Ah, good. Alarms were noisy, and now he had an ally, and even when Jethro was unarmed, he was still dangerous and surely more dangerous than this woman spouting unintelligible nonsense at him.

"Jethro," he strode across the room, relieved, away from the corpse on the table, and toward the door, Gibbs, and the alarm, in that order of importance. "Dr. Safire has been telling me the most interesting things about... erm...." Mallard couldn't bring himself to say the word.

"About him?" Gibbs prodded.

"Ah, yes, as a start."

Gibbs pulled a chair out and straddled it backward. "Good, let's talk."

"Oh dear," Ducky said aloud as inwardly he tried to determine what series of facial cues would encourage Jethro to leap up and fling cuffs on Safire without actually bringing the attention of the entire building as hitting the general alarm would do.

Gibbs grinned up at Safire and Ducky was reminded of just how lupine Gibbs himself could be. "So, Dr. Safire," Gibbs started, "let's talk about Aurors."

\---::: ---

Abby puttered about the lab. Too much had happened last night and she'd left before they'd gotten back from the park, so she let Tim hang around because she couldn't stop patting his shoulder and worrying about how much damage the bandages were covering. "I just, with the..."

"Could we please not talk about it? Not that you are actually talking, but c'mon."

"McGee! You got bit last night. Or clawed. Or something. By something. But you don't know what. Are you sure you didn't hit your head?"

Tim rubbed his temples with his good hand. "Actually no, Abby, I'm not. But the EMTs said no concussion, so I'm chalking it up to needing a lot more time on PT than I'm getting these days."

"Do you need to sit down?" She rolled the chair to him.

"No, what I'd really like to do is actually see the image on this tape."

"Sounds good to me," added Gibbs from the doorway.

Yay! She made grabby hands at the door. "Gibbs! That's not a ... not that."

Gibbs handed the bottle of water and paper pack of Tylenol to Tim. "They didn't give you anything?"

Tim ducked his head. "I, um, wouldn't have taken anything they gave me after..." He waved his hand. At Gibb's nod, he continued. "I need to work. They sent the video feed."

"But there's something wrong. It's acting as though the pixels are in the right place on the source, but when they show on the monitor, they're randomized." Abby finished

Gibbs said, "So fix it."

"You won't have time to," came a voice from the doorway.

Two refugees from a Robin Hood remake stood behind a man in a shearling coat. It should have been funny, but Gibbs wasn't laughing, and in fact, he'd shifted his weight to the side and was holding his hand in the funny way that she shouldn't have known but did and oh god, now she had to look like she didn't know that Gibbs was covering his weapon because that was never never good and absolutely bad in her lab. Glass! Electronics! A complete lack of hearing protection!

Abby stood in front of the monitor, blocking as much of it as she could from the three men invading her domain.

"You again." Gibbs' voice was cold and harsh.

The guy in front said, "We need to take Agent McGee into protective custody," and Abby felt Tim tense beside her.

But Gibbs, wonderful Gibbs, said, "No, you don’t," in the firm voice.

"You don’t understand."

"I don’t need to. No." Gibbs said and Abby totally didn't cheer because Gibbs was still holding his hand over his hip.

Tim, to her side, drew his weapon, and Abby realized that there was no way, short of dropping to the floor and rolling under the table, that she could get out of the way.

The guy in the sheep coat didn't even look at Tim, though the two guys behind him did. The dark haired one stepped back, half into the hall. Abby tried to be invisible. The leader-type said, "I thought we had an understanding."

Abby relaxed. Gibbs didn't. Tim's gun, in the corner of her eye, didn't move. She went back to remembering where the lab stool was and whether she'd hit it if she dove under the table. She decided she could live with the bruising if she did.

Gibbs said, "You can question him. With my full cooperation. Right here."

"I'm afraid it's not just questions I have. I'm trying very hard to help him."

The two guys behind him looked at each other. He stepped forward and they actually came into the room. "This is my jurisdiction."

"Not here, not in this building," Gibbs stated. "My investigation."

The guy in the coat spread his hands, but as happy as Abby was to see him not draw a gun in her lab, the motion pulled his coat out enough to show a leather holster and a ridiculously oversized revolver tucked into it. He ducked his head to one side and quirked one side of his mouth. "That is acceptable. We wouldn't dream of interfering with your investigation. We just need your man."

Gibbs said, "Not the tape?" The gun in Abby's peripheral vision was trembling. Abby glanced over. A small spot of red on the bandage over Tim's arm was slowly growing.

The guy with the revolver smiled and there was absolutely nothing friendly about it. "There's nothing on the tape that we need or want."

Gibbs said, "Because you knew it was useless already." The two other guys behind him moved closer and now all three of them were in her lab and she really really wanted Gibbs to do something other than glare at the strangers.

The guy in the coat said, "No mutual disclosure, Agent Gibbs." He looked straight at Gibbs, still half smiling.

Gibbs shook his head, but he dropped his arm, and a half second later, Tim holstered his gun.

"Abby, this is Franklin Calder, with the OTHER FBI, and Aurors Sheppard and Bard and no, I don't know what the hell auror means."

Abby waved and dropped a curtsy. Calder looked confused, but the two behind him, the Aurors, nodded politely at her. Calder, glanced back, then cleared the door as Ziva walked in with a girl with frazzled brown hair and really cute tights.

Gibbs glared at Calder, who had taken a step back with wide eyes. "She with you?

The girl looked at Gibbs, turning her back on Calder. "Separate services."

Sheppard leaned towards Calder, and said, "In a way."

"I can help with your video issue, Agent Gibbs," offered the newcomer.

"No, you can't," stated Calder, flatly. "Statute."

"Yes, I can. Check with Minister Shacklebolt." She motioned at the monitor. "I can clear that."

Calder leaned against the wall. "I'll enjoy watching you try. MY service says it can't be done. Theirs," he gestured at the aurors, "says you ought to leave it alone."

"Care to wager against her, Franklin?" asked yet another strange woman, this one Gibbs' age, with Ducky in tow. Abby thought her lab was getting crowded and far too many of the people in it were not happy with one another. Gibbs was looking downright cranky. Well, obviously cranky, as opposed to his usual sort of general cranky. Ducky looked like his stomach was bothering him.

"Madame Safire! Good to see you again. In spite of the circumstances."

“Lovely to see you, dear," Safire said. "and more importantly to our conversation here, I think they need to see it." Safire went on, "She's with me, and therefore, by extension, she's with St. Mungo's."

Calder shook his head. "My brief is to contain and evaluate the situation. Too many folk are at risk."

The two guys behind him, Bard and Sheppard, looked at each other and relaxed, and Abby took a breath.

Abby stepped up, "So are we all friends now?" Bard and Sheppard carefully didn't laugh but she could see the shorter one smile. Gibbs still looked pretty pissed off, but not at her, and Calder crossed his arms, eyes narrowed. Time to choose sides. She crossed over to the newcomer and stuck out her hand, daring anyone to comment. "I'm Abby Sciuto," she offered. "That's Gibbs, that's Calder, those two are Bard and Sheppard, though I don't know which one is which, and that's McGee."

"Hermione Granger." Hermione offered her hand as well, nodding at Tim and ignoring everyone else

"Hermione, okay. If you're with them, then you know about the tape, too?" asked Abby

Calder spoke up. "Miss Granger won't be able to get an image off the tape." He smiled, but his body language was anything but happy. Abby decided she didn't like him.

Hermione raised one eyebrow and Abby had a startling sense of looking into a mirror. Well, a shorter, suburban, disney-fied mirror. "I will." She turned to Tim and asked, "You've tried resolving the digital image?"

"Right, the information is there, but I can't unscramble it." Tim said. Abby cleared her throat. "Um, we can't unscramble it," he added.

"Not a problem. Your source isn't corrupted as it seems; it's an illusion." She tapped the glass and that shouldn't have done anything, but the image cleared. Calder looked like he'd been sucker punched, and she fixed him with a challenging stare. "Of course I can break it. Who do you think built that sp-- program?"

"It wasn't your skill I was questioning, but your judgment." Calder said, the pain in his voice evident. Abby thought she might have decided about him too soon. Safire hung her head.

The cctv camera had captured the scene neatly: Ducky and Palmer loading the van and driving away. The man in the red shirt looking nervously at two others, one in a black sweatshirt, his haircut screaming military, and another with unkempt shoulder length hair who looked as if he were wearing a frock coat.

"Skoll." Sheppard spat.

Calder's eyes went hard, and Abby knew he was a killer. Like Ziva, like Gibbs, Calder would kill to protect.

Tim lunged at the keyboard to save the image, brushing against Hermione hard enough to make her step forward. At his muttered apology, she shook her head. "Not a problem, you're welcome. Oh and by the way, hello again, Agent McGee."

McGee made the constipated face he got when he was pissed and trying to hide it. "Was there a reason for complicating the issue?"

Gibbs stepped forward and pulled her away from the table, pushing her halfway to the door, shoving her up against Safire. "I knew it. The civilian at the ambulance. Out. We don’t work with civilians. Interfering with a crime scene just cost you whatever they," he pointed at Calder and company, "or she may say."

Hermione drew herself up to nowhere near tall enough to go nose to nose with Gibbs. "Agent Gibbs, I haven't been a 'civilian' since I was eleven, I can help you and your agent, and I can’t," she nodded at the aurors, "explain more. If you can bring yourself to trust me, I have information..."

Gibbs slapped his hand against the door and they all jumped. "No. I can’t bring myself to trust you because I don’t. You show up at a crime scene with i.d. so new that it's still warm around the edges and then half the witnesses don't remember you, including the medic who treated you, including me. You come in here, wave your hands and fix something that my best people can’t. I don’t trust you because you know too much and you play mysterious and that makes me angry. And you don’t look scared enough to realize that I’m angry."

She looked him directly in the eye and said, "Your anger is not a weapon I fear, not when lives are at stake."

He said, "Do you fear werewolves?" in entirely too reasonable a voice for Abby's piece of mind.

"Yes," she answered. "A great deal. More than that, I fear Agent McGee has been infected, and Dr. Safire and I are his only chance at a cure."

Calder said, "There is no cure, Miss Granger. Your strain is a contagious disease, only manageable with medication."

Hermione threw her hands into the air and cried, "You won't even listen, will you? Wolfsbane is–"

Abby waved her arms and raised her voice. "That’s it! Anyone not working, out of my lab." She saw Gibbs grin as Calder was caught in mid-word.

Safire stepped up and said, "Agents Gibbs and Calder, I'd like to show you something in the morgue, if I may."

"Sheppard, you're with me. Bard, keep an eye on our 'civilian' help," ordered Calder. "I will really need a word with you." He glared at Safire, and swept out the door behind Ducky.

Bard grinned at Sheppard. "You get to examine the stiff, and I get to watch the skirts. Told you he liked me best."

Gibbs hesitated in the doorway. "Abs, you want Ziva to keep you company?"

She made a face at him. "Oh please, this is my lab. I can kick them out." She balled up her hands into fists and frowned most ferociously.

Hermione just looked confused, and not at all intimidated, "We're working together."

Gibbs waved one hand and said "Play nicely, Abs," as he walked away.

\---:::---

Ziva entered the morgue several steps behind the others. She stood next to Tony, who leaned over to whisper, "Are they seriously saying that Probie's been bitten by a werewolf or am I dreaming? And if I'm dreaming, where's the Swedish bikini team?"

Ziva whispered back, "You dream of the Swedish bikini team in the morgue?"

Tony ignored that. " Just how contagious is this, do you think?"

"Surely it's not as contagious as the plague…" Ziva said, and suddenly Calder and Safire stopped arguing and looked at her.

Tony realized they were looking at them and said hastily, "Not that we've had any outbreaks of the plague, or anything. Lately." Safire looked worried; Calder just glowered at both of them. Gibbs stepped up and Calder turned to him. Tony muttered, "Let's hope you are right."

Safire approached them, leaving Gibbs to argue with Calder. "Were you bitten?"

Tony said, "No, but I’ve got incredibly bad luck with this sort of thing, and I really don't want to be a werewolf."

Ziva nodded. "I agree. I don't want you to be a werewolf."

Tony eyed her. "That’s … suspiciously caring of you."

Ziva continued, "It takes you twenty minutes and two mirrors to scrunchie your hair. What would you do with a pelt?" She turned her attention to the discussion in the center of the room.

Calder walked around the corpse, eyed the head wound and said, "That is a remarkably well-placed shot, given the conditions."

Ducky remarked, "Our Ziva is quite the marksman."

Calder agreed, "He certainly is."

"She," Gibbs corrected, and nodded to the door where Ziva was lingering. He said by way of introduction, "Agent Franklin Calder of the OTHER FBI, Officer Ziva David, on special assignment from Mossad."

Calder put his hands behind his back. Ziva did not leave her doorway. He said, "Mossad. Ari Haswari is the only member of your service that I know, and he is not that good a shot."

"He was not." Ziva corrected.

Ducky bustled about the table and clinked his tools. "There aren’t many who are. Agent David is a woman of remarkable talents."

Safire clucked from the far side of the room. "Oh, my dear, are you all right?

Ziva frowned. "Of course, why would I not be?"

Safire looked surprised and said, "Why, my dear, you shot a man last night". Behind her, Calder rolled his eyes and Ziva decided she liked him the better for it.

"Not my first. Not likely to be my last." Ziva thought, if they were willing to call it a man, all the better for her.

Sheppard spoke from the corner where he stood with his arms crossed. "He's right though, that's a hell of a shot. Couldn't have stopped him myself with an offensive spell if he was moving. They're fast."

Ziva inclined her head in acknowledgment. "Thank you."

Safire busied herself pulling items out of her bag. "Here, use these," she said, and handed several dishes to Ducky. They looked suspiciously like the nut dishes Ziva's grandmother used at Rosh Hashana.

Ducky took the metal dish and peered at it. "Is that silver?"

"We know that silver insulates the contagion. Wood doesn't, glass only sometimes. I'd rather use what I know to be efficacious," Safire said.

Mallard set aside his specimen container and picked up the silver dish, clumsy with its unaccustomed shape. He said, "The bullets recovered from PFC Walker were not silver."

Sheppard spoke from his corner of the room. "We aren’t Lycanthrope specialists and silver weaponry, left laying about, tends to attract notice."

Mallard nodded. "But you are responsible for the sprig of mistletoe embedded in his thigh?" Sheppard nodded gravely and Ducky went on, "And mistletoe is more effective than bullets?"

Sheppard said, "We used what we had. We bagged one, sent him back to the Ministry, but the other two slipped away. The one we got is a foot solider, but of the two who slipped us, one's the pack leader. That's who mauled your man. The other is this fellow." He gestured to the slab.

Calder said, "That's how this pack runs, Agent Gibbs. One alone is just a monster, but the ones that work alone are usually hiding from us. Not recruiting. Actively infecting others for whatever reason. There's no cure. There's a po -- a medicine, that manages the symptoms. This is why we can't let your Agent stay in civilization. He's too dangerous."

Gibbs said, "Dr. Safire here says the cure is as bad as the disease."

"No," she said quietly. "The disease is horrible." She took a shaky breath. "Wolfsbane is only a treatment." She raised a hand to stop Calder. "I don't argue that the Wolfsbane is necessary, but there may be an alternative to condemning the recently infected immediately to Wolfsbane. That is what we are researching."

Ducky mused, "That's a subtle difference to those currently infected."

Safire raised a perfectly plucked brow at Ducky. "Starting to believe, or still wishing you'd sounded the alarm?"

Ducky looked at her, with a very serious expression on his face. "This is a young man's life we're talking about. Is this really something you think you can do?"

"I do," she said firmly. "What's more, your Uncle Bernard is my colleague at St. Mungo's. No matter what they've told you, Doctor..."

"Ducky, please. I'm comfortable with that."

"Ducky, then," she continued. "No matter what they've told you, Bernard is not dead, or mad. He merely has a different reality that includes some things you simply don't know about. You would like him, I think." She picked up the clipboard and asked, "Your notes? Do you mind if I...?"

Ducky looked to Gibbs, who said "Full co-operation" with a humorless smile.

Calder reached over and pulled the clipboard out of her hand. She and Ducky shared near identical expressions of indignation, but he spoke to Gibbs, "Here's what you don't know, Agent Gibbs." He glanced through Ducky's file, "hmm. Lance Corporal Jesse Blain. USMC. Served Afghanistan, two tours." He started flipping pages randomly, clearly not parsing any meaning from Ducky's scrawl and Palmer's shorthand, gathering his thoughts. "What you're seeing here is the European strain of the disease. There is no cure, no treatment but Wolfsbane, two ingredients of which don't grow well on American soil. It wasn't a problem, the American strain being hereditary, until air travel made it possible for the were to migrate. Our policy is very clear, and Doctor Safire has no jurisdiction here, especially not on this wild goose chase."

Safire paled and straightened her back. "You would condemn this young man, without even trying?"

Calder stiffened, "With all respect, doctor, these are monsters who need to be exterminated.." He flipped Ducky's file onto the table with the autopsy instruments and Ducky scrambled to catch it.

Safire refused to back down, saying, "No, what you don't understand, Agent Calder, is that these are men, THIS is a man who deserves our help." Her eyes softened. "I expected better from you, Franklin."

His eyes went hard, and Ziva recognized the shift in his stance. "When human, yes. But the wolf doesn't stop, and I have those scars. I've pulled the trigger before, Madame Doctor, and no other will ever be as painful." Calder pulled a thick leather folded case from an interior pocket far too small to hold it and slapped it on the empty autopsy table. He yanked it open and pulled forth photos, black and white like any crime scene, but these images moved, at least where the beings in them were living. Aurors and others in robes walked among disemboweled cattle and eviscerated humans, blood and more blood, the white bone of corpses glowing in the odd grey light of the images. Every photo was gruesome and Ziva caught herself looking past the stark black blood to find familiar faces, the two Aurors in the corner of one, pulling cloth over a child's corpse, Calder toeing a mutilated horse, dressed in a sheepskin coat, out of place among the others.

His tone turned vicious. "European werewolves MUST transform at the full moon. With wolfsbane, strength of will, the help of their family, friends, and silver manacles, they can force some small bit of their humanity into the transformation. They don't want to be monsters. But a moment's distraction and the beast will overtake them, make them into unthinking killers. It does not matter if they shift to defend their families; after transforming, they are as likely to kill their own children as their attacker. There is no reasoning, just bloodlust. Some weres choose to transform at other times. They choose to kill. But either way, they destroy what they can touch."

Safire raised one hand to forestall him, "I spoke with a young American were who took advantage of an opportunity to go to Tibet and study, to try to control his change with meditation. He recognizes the benefits of the teaching, and still locks himself in during the full moon, for fear of doing injury to a loved one.

"He is the one who told me," she gestured towards a photo and Ziva recognized Granger at one edge of it, "who told us, about the differences. The smell that the newly bitten don't have until after the first change. That those who have taken the Wolfsbane before their first change have the same scent as the old were. Something makes them different, and my work has been to identify the process." She turned to Gibbs, now, pleading, "I truly believe that we can help your colleague. I think we can keep him from changing. Your instruments show me the same things my... techniques... have led me to conclude."

"If the virus, "she stumbled over the word and glanced to Mallard as though for affirmation, "does not bond with his original cells, he can be saved. My treatment will not hurt him. It may not succeed, but it will not hasten the process.

"The curse can be contained, to an extent, with Wolfsbane, yes. A were can be chained, or drugged into submission, or redirected, or killed. We do that; you do that. But Miss Granger and I think there may be a cure."

Calder sliced the air with one hand and said, "There is no cure. St. Mungo's gave up centuries ago."

"Then it's past time to work on the problem again," Safire stated. And I, or rather, well, erm, Hermione, may have access to, um ... access to materials that St. Mungo's and the ministry traditionally haven't. Don't. Erm."

Calder glared. "That's not really helping your argument. She's not a Healer, not a mediwizard. Merlin knows what she's found in that repository."

"You know what she has done, what she can do." Safire looked to the others, clearly censoring herself.

He scoffed, "Make friends at school."

Safire blinked at him in surprise, "I didn't think you a fool, Agent Calder."

Ziva could see Sheppard in the corner react as Calder went on, "Foolish? No. But I don't trust anyone given free rein to work outside the system, responsible only to herself and the Minister of Magic, above the law, with license to ride roughshod over any department, in any country. You, of all people, know my history."

Gibbs was watching with the same rapt attention Sheppard was. Ziva wondered for a moment what the actual fight as about, since there quite obviously was one under what they were actually saying.

Safire paled. "You don't have to trust her. Kingsley Shacklebolt does, and that is where her orders come from. To stop it, Franklin, from ever happening again."

Calder clenched his jaw and nodded.

DiNozzo leaned toward her and whispered, "Was that a jurisdictional fight?"

"I believe so."

"Who won?"

"Not sure."

Calder glanced back at them and DiNozzo smiled his most charming Hollywood grin. Calder, clearly unimpressed, turned back to Safire. "I want regular communication and the Aurors stay with you." Calder turned to Sheppard, "First priority is to find Skoll, stop him, capture or eliminate him and his threat. If he is building a new pack, scrub it, but we need to find him. Clean up behind yourself as best you can, I'll be back with people to finish that, but I don't like any of this cooperation. If we can't find the pack, there'll be... complications."

Sheppard recited his instructions back in the tone she already knew well, "Aye. Primary goal is capture or elimination of Skoll, secondary is intelligence on past and current actions, yes sir. Tertiary is assisting the ladies and their cure for the agent?"

"No." Calder didn't look around, though Safire was watching him intently. "There is no cure, Auror Sheppard. There wasn't one ten years ago, there wasn't one a century ago, there isn't one now. Either he drinks the Wolfsbane in two nights or he goes in a cage. I expect you to do that."

Sheppard focused his gaze somewhere past Calder's left shoulder, "Sir, yes sir."

Calder stormed out. Gibbs hollered for McGee to escort him and McGee chased Calder down the hall.

Ziva said to DiNozzo, "I think, if that was a battle, we won."

Gibbs pulled the file out of Ducky's hand and gave it to Safire, never breaking eye contact with Sheppard. "Doctor, you've got a cure to work on," he said.

Sheppard added, "And I need to talk to your man about Wolfsbane."

Ziva looked at DiNozzo and shrugged. "Perhaps."

Sheppard glanced at them and looked irritated, but she'd no fear of him. He considered himself a good cop and that limited his potential for intimidation. Good, or possibly bad, depending on what Dr. Mallard was able to extract from the body in front of him. She'd given it no more than a cursory glance, verifying that her aim had been true, despite the illusion of the actual shot. She'd never misread a target, not since she was old enough to test, and the placement of the entry wound reassured her in the face of what she could only consider a visual hallucination. Because the body on Mallard's slab was not the ... the thing she'd shot under the moonlight.

And she didn't want to watch McGee become that.

\---:::---

Abby turned to the auror they'd left in her lab and asked, "So, which one are you?"

He grinned, his eyes twinkling like Santa Claus's should and swept into a grandiose bow. "Padraig Bard, at your service, mum." She curtseyed back and headed to her office for another pen.

Pat pulled a round brownish red teapot and two chunky ceramic mugs out of his pocket. One was green, the other black, and he handed the black one to Hermione. "Miss Sciuto?" he called. "Would you like some tea?"

Abby stuck her head out the door, "Call me Abby, and I'm good." She rattled the ice in her CafPow cup.

"Thank you," Hermione said as he breathed in the steam rising from the cup. "I'm really not good with conflict."

Pat smiled genially. "Good, that's fine with me. You two won't be doing anything rash that requires my jumping up and chasing you, eh?"

Hermione laughed. "No, not really. Unless something makes the table run after us. I need to set up a baseline for the victim's blood and run some tests."

"It's Tim," interrupted Abby. "Not victim, Tim McGee." Hermione nodded.

"Potions class is fine, Miss Granger. I just don't want to start writing my report and have to put it away quickly."

"Go ahead," she said, and she started pulling equipment out of a bag that Abby hadn't noticed before.

He curled up in the plastic chair in the corner, unfolded a piece of paper into a wooden clapboard, balanced it on a stick and the impossibly delicate contraption held steady as her lab table while he pulled ink and quill out of another pocket and started to write in a careful cramped hand. Abby was fascinated by the flicking of the feather. Eventually, she turned to see Hermione with a Dell laptop with wooden card jutting out of the external modem port, crystals glittering along the edge. The keyboard was unmodified, but as Hermione typed, alchemical symbols appeared on the monitor. She looked up, and at Abby's nod, glanced over to the living, breathing 18th century woodcut scratching with a feather in the corner of the lab.

"I can write with a quill, but typing is faster for me," Hermione said.

Abby mused, "You seem more comfortable with our world."

"I was born in it. "

"That must be confusing. "

"I've lived in both since I was eleven. Don't think about it much, but those from the Muggle world don't understand what I can do is real, and those from the Wizarding world don't bother with the benefits of living in a place with modern plumbing and central heat. Not to mention Dr. Scholl's and high end chocolate that doesn't crawl, wiggle or otherwise try to escape." They both turned at Pat's rumbling laugh.

"Ducky says he's eaten in parts of the world where the food does try to escape," Abby offered. Hermione grinned and Abby continued, "I can imagine how dating might be a problem."

"I've given that up. I don't have time to explain five times a day how to use a microwave and I'm not ego-centric enough to be the whole of someone's world."

"Maybe you are just dating all the wrong people."

"Both of them."

Abby gave her an understanding look and nodded.

They worked in silence for a while.

"How'd you get involved in all this anyway?" asked Abby. "Do you mind if I turn the music back on?"

Eventually, Hermione reached for her tea again, and said, "Actually, that's how I got involved in this. Lavender, she was an old school mate, and she sent me a card, to come round for tea. Addressed it to the fellow member of the Weasley Ex-Girlfriend's club. I mean really, we had nothing in common save a birth year. Well, and Ron. I was working for the Ministry and she taught children, because she thought.... We went through a lot, our last two years in school, and she wanted something where she'd not be threatened, but that's not what happened."

"Miss Granger..." cautioned Bard.

"What did happen?" prompted Abby

Hermione waved a hand at Bard and looked Abby in the eye. "She stood in the door of a classroom made of pasteboard and paper, with the only defense she had, her wand, to face down a werewolf."

"For real?"

Hermione nodded. "She wasn't ..." She glanced back at Bard, who didn't hide that he was listening, then back to Abby. "Well, it doesn't matter who she wasn't. There are people who've walked away from Were and people who've run screaming from them and I'll cheerfully admit that I'm part of that second group. Lavender had the care of other people's children, actual small children cowering behind her, so she told the bigger ones to shield the smaller ones, and stood between them and a full turned wolf, with no humanity in his eyes. She faced him with nothing more than charms and illusions and rudimentary dueling training. She even slowed him down. A bit. Not enough."

Bard growled, and she raised the tea to her lips with shaking hands before continuing, "She survived the attack. The aurors," she nodded at Bard, "got there right after, just after she went down. But the parents of the children she'd saved, they expressed _concern_ ," her lip twisted in obvious anger, "that their children would be taught by a woman with what is, after all, an infectious disease. All very proper, over tea and ginger biscuits and with little notes of thanks on floral paper."

Abby didn't bother to hide her horror.

"I'd been working with Dr. Safire on another project," continued Hermione, "but, well, that could wait, and Lavender knew me. I think at that time, she still had hope. She volunteered for the early stages of my research, before we found that it only has a window of use, and after that, she volunteered for research on Wolfsbane, the potion, this treatment that the Aurors want your ...that they want McGee to take. They turned her down, because it works as it is, so why sink more research into it, why would they bother to make it less painful, less vile, less poisonous. It’s not as though the Were who are identified have a choice in taking it. Because the alternative is ..." she shook her head, arguing with someone in her memory, perhaps, "the alternative is to let more people like Lavender face them over children's toys, with a cotton jumper for armor and an insufficient education for an arsenal."

Pat's voice was soft. "So give us a choice. Prove that it works. Calder's an American, but he's a good man for all that."

Hermione said quietly, "I honestly would rather work with him than against."

Pat laughed, "Hard to convince the Ministry of that, given your history, or even their Council. Nah, go on, girl. I'm distracting you. You've only got two days to make your point."

Abby spoke. "Your school seems to have done well enough by you." At Hermione's startled glance, she continued, "You said 'insufficient education'."

Hermione grinned, "I took on a special project my last year. Call it an advanced study." They both ignored Pat snorting with laughter. "Besides, I was the only one not making eyes at the instructor for what little dueling training we did have."

"So you're better."

"Not as good as some."

"But better than your friend."

"The healers already did this with me, right after."

Abby widened her eyes. Sometimes the innocent look worked. Apparently, not this time.

Hermione turned back to the centrifuge. "Yes, I was there; yes, I might have been able to help; no, I didn't get there in time; yes, I... yes, this is why I redirected my ...why I took on this project. Happy?"

"No, just curious." Abby decided to let it drop. "Lymphatic fluid?"

"Dr. Safire thinks that lycanthropy is in some way akin to the neurological diseases. That it doesn't settle, bond, to the body immediately, and that's our window. As to why some people shift over immediately and some don't until the first transformation, we just don't know. We think that some may actually hold out until the second or even third moon, but we don't have any way to prove it, because as soon as bite victims are found, they are given Wolfsbane and once they transform with the Wolfsbane, it's set. The Aurors won't work with us so we can get to people after infection but before transformation."

Pat raised his hands. "Don't look at me like that, lass. I'd no idea there was any other option."

Hermione said coldly, "Oh, I've had aurors tell me that as far as they are concerned, it's Wolfsbane or hemlock."

"That's true. Calder adds an option. That revolver of his." He held her eye. Hermione eventually sighed and turned back to her computer.

Abby jumped when the phone rang. She wasn't used to not having music playing. Gibbs wanted her to escort Hermione and Pat up to the office area.  
\---:::--

Gibbs nodded to Ducky, then jerked his head at Sheppard and headed for the end of the hall. He waited inside the elevator until Sheppard joined him, gave it a count, then hit the button. Sheppard swayed as the elevator stopped, then pushed his weight to the balls of his feet, ready for an attack. Gibbs kept his arms down, studiously non-confrontational.

"How well do you know Calder?" Gibbs asked.

"Eh? He's a Yank. By reputation, I suppose."

"And that is?"

"He's a good enough man."

"Not what I asked."

"Then ask properly."

"Do you think Safire's got a cure?"

"That's not about Calder."

"I don't like operating blind."

"Then give up your man and go on about your life. We'll be gone before a feather hits the ground."

"No." Gibbs shook his head. He needed information, background, alternatives. "Has anyone tried to keep them together?"

"What? Were packs? Yeh, in fact they have. In my father's time and ... more recently. "

"Like a special forces team? The SAS?"

"An army of dark creatures, killing civilians and poisoning the Ministry. Not so special."

Gibbs let his frustration seep into his voice. "McGee isn't evil."

"No, but the wolf is. No," he corrected himself, "you're right, not evil, but bestial, feral. Uncontrolled."

"Then we find a way to control them."

"Aye." Sheppard nodded. "That would be the Wolfsbane."

"Other than drugging them." He mashed the stop button again and the elevator lurched into motion.

"Cages aren't much better, Agent Gibbs. Nor chains."

\---:::---

When Abby led Hermione and Pat to the upstairs offices, the plasma screen was playing the de-randomized up video of the crime scene where Tim had been bitten. Abby watched it again, intent on memorizing the details. Ducky arriving in the van, Ziva pacing. She thought she could spot the moment when Tony first saw Sheppard and Bard, incongruous in their garb, and now, knowing what she was looking for, she saw the others, the marine on the slab downstairs who here was captured on tape walking and skulking, and his companions, a wiry guy with shaggy hair who just looked mean, and a burly guy, hair shaved close, with the walk that she associated with Gibbs, held in, ready to sprint.

The elevator dinged and Auror Sheppard lunged out a little too quickly, wary of the doors. Gibbs followed, obviously not laughing. Pat leaned over and said, "You should see the potions set up she's got downstairs. S'terrifying."

Sheppard growled back, "Yer a bundle of laughs. Have you seen what they use instead of stairs?"

Abby stood next to Hermione close enough to eavesdrop, but watching the main screen trying to be subtle. From the way Hermione was carefully not paying attention to the aurors, she was doing exactly the same.

“Dick, we need to help the chit.”

"What are you on about? I swear, it's something in the Muggle air. No. We find Skoll. That's what we need to do. Secondary, we babysit until they realize that we are right, we dose the Yank, then he's the Council's problem and we go home."

"Dick, we can help the medi-witches."

"We are not St. Mungo's, we are Aurors. Granted, currently on loan to Agent Calder's people, so we're sheriffs or whatever they are, but what we are not, we are not Potions teachers."

“Not what I said. What I said was 'Dick, we need to help Hermione find her cure.' ”

“Pat, are you really going to push this? You have no idea --"

“Dick.” Padraig was calmly focused only on the screen, as time rocked forward and back to let Tim freezeframe for screen grabs. Right now, it showed Ducky and Palmer opening the back of the van. Sheppard ran his hand through his hair, opened his mouth, closed it, ran his hand through his hair again, then sighed.

Pat smiled.

Sheppard scratched the back of his neck and turned to Hermione. “Right then, Granger, so you’re our resident expert? What do you need us to do?”

Gibbs interrupted, "We need information. What," he glanced at Safire, "what other than Wolfsbane has been tried. Physical restraints, retraining. Safire said meditation." Abby saw Tim glance up, his eyes wide.

Safire shook her head. "The strains are different. New World Lycanthropy, as you call them, skinwalkers..."

Gibbs narrowed his eyes. Abby signed, "What?" Gibbs responded, his hands held low, "I don't call them anything."

Safire continued, "are different, both magically and physically from European were, which is part of Calder's...difficulty with our project."

"What's the full story there?" Gibbs asked.

Pat said, "His wife was ---" But Sheppard punched his arm and he shut up.

Sheppard said, "Calder's history is not a part of the project. Let the man have his privacy." Gibbs slapped the desk, then pointed to McGee, his lips pressed tight against his teeth. McGee went white.

Hermione said quietly. "He may actually be a key." Everyone turned to look at her, Gibbs and Sheppard still hostile. She twisted her hands. "I had a friend send me the file. Calder began the study of animagery." Only Sheppard and Bard nodded. "Hypothetically, a single wolf can be accompanied by other... um ... non-wolves. As chaperones, sort of. Companions. Distractions. Not that there is any official record of it, of course. Pack follows dominance. If that companion is dominant, well..."

"So we have a cure that might not work and this animage thing," said Gibbs, dryly.

Sheppard said, "You wanted alternatives. I told you there weren't any. These ideas are all hypothetical."

"I want to know what animagery is. But I'll take anything more than what I've got. Co-operation is good," Gibbs tilted his head, "even if it's not actually with me."

Hermione said, “If you're willing to work with me, don’t file my plans behind my back with either the American Council or the British Ministry. We need to work together and right now that means without them.”

Sheppard closed his eyes and said, “Oh, aye, that’s a given. Which means you’ll be getting us and no one else, my girl.”

Pat smiled, “She’ll not be needing anyone else, boyo.”

Sheppard tipped his head down, glaring at his shoes, “Paddy, a team of twelve trained aurors …”

“… didn’t have St. Mungo’s and a Hero of the Battle o’ Hogwarts working with them.”

Abby could see Hermione flinch at that, and wondered, until she caught Gibbs' eye, then his nod. Aha. What was with these people? Normal people didn't run into burning buildings, and if they did, then they didn't walk around vaguely embarrassed by it. Then again, she thought, who in the room counted as normal. Other than her, of course.

\---:::---

 

Hermione slipped away from both the Aurors and the American agents to think. She had so little experience with being an adult, Hermione thought. Nine years out of school and she was still the student know-it-all; she was going to live in Hogwart’s figuratively if not literally for the rest of her life. Though if Skoll got his claws near her, that wouldn’t be long. Underground as it was, with the light off, Dr. Mallard's dissection room was dark, the light from the hall casting shadows in unexpected places. Hermione looked around; there was a shadowy figure near the odd drawers in the wall. Quietly, she walked towards the figure, whose bowed shoulders hitched slightly.

"Agent McGee?"

He whirled, hand wiping at his eyes. "Miss Granger."

How did other people do this? she thought. Miss Granger was a student. Usually in trouble. Hermione was Ron's favorite know-it-all, and Victor never had gotten her name right, not ever. "I think ...Would you call me Hermione, please?"

He nodded, and she dug in her pocket for her handkerchief. She offered it to him, and he pulled out his own.

"Should I ask?"

"I'm a monster, Hermione. I saw the pictures, Calder, did you know that Calder killed his own wife? In the hall, he told me. She'd been infected and ... She was a monster. And so am I." He sounded angry and she remembered sitting on Lavender’s threadbare couch with overdue notices and job rejections piled around them, as Lavender carefully didn’t cry and Hermione promised things she wouldn't be able to deliver.

"Not yet. Not ever." She locked eyes with him. "Not ever," she repeated. His breath hitched again, and she touched his arm. "I believe it will work." She had to. She’d spent too many weeks in the Malfoy library drinking cold tea, alienated too many people at the Ministry and out of it. Madame Safire had even been ridiculed by her peers and the doddering old fools at St. Mungo’s, but she knew it would work, if she could just isolate the carrier base. She opened her mouth to say so and realized that the man in front of her had no interest in the science of it, not right then. “It will work.”

"I need to know I will never turn into one of those things and hurt someone."

"I'll take care of it. I promise you." Harry’d died to keep from killing. What was she promising this Muggle stranger?

"How, then? How would you stop me? With a potion? A magic spell? I don’t… I don’t believe in myths and magic. I know the difference between reality and fantasy."

"Do you, Agent McGee? I could paralyze you, albeit temporarily, with a spell I learned at eleven. A bit overwhelming, isn’t it? Imagine what I can do now." She wrapped her arms around her ribs to hide the shaking. What could she do? For all her research, so much depended on Safire, on her and too much was terra incognito, forging ahead of where anyone else had dared explore. She remembered Bill’s face, when they brought him home to the Burrow, Molly weeping about her beautiful baby, the tension filling the air like smoke until they’d determined he wasn’t infected. She remembered Lupin’s wariness, the layers of clothing he wore as though that would help, the distance he kept from all of them, even Tonks, even at the end.

"And when I got away? When I tried to eat someone?" His voice took on an edge of hysteria. "Have you leveled up enough to stop me, then? Can you stop me from doing this to someone else?"

"I would kill you." she said quietly. "Avada Kedavra is quite painless, unlike a gun shot."

He gaped at her. She waited, swallowed her next words, refused to rescind or even soften her offer. He blinked, then took a shuddering breath. “I’m not sure whether I should say ‘thank you’ or ‘I’m sorry,’ ” he said.

"You can decide later. Safire and I will make it work. We will save you."

"That's some world you come from, Hermione."

"I saw the good parts of magic before I met the monsters."

"There are good parts?" he asked. She stiffened. "Sorry, not that… I mean… "

She said, "We are standing in a morgue, Agent McGee. Your world has monsters, too."

"You could,” he ran his hands through his hair, making it stand up on end, “you could call me Tim. Since you are going to save me, after all."

"All right, Tim."

He smiled, half his mouth going up and the other half down. She continued, “There’s no way I can prove this, but I’m really quite clever and Madame Safire is ever so…” she looked up and lost her words. He was smiling at her with both sides of his mouth now, and she smiled back, unexpectedly charmed, “What?”

“I like the idea of being quite clever.” She narrowed her eyes at him, wondering if she was being mocked, and he continued, “Of the three of us, Ziva’s the tough guy and Tony’s… well, I’m not actually entirely sure what Tony is, but it’s pretty much universally agreed that I’m the smart one.”

“Ah,” she started, with no idea of what she wanted to say.

“Kind of nice to share it.” He nodded, answering some unasked question, and shoved his hands in his pockets as he headed for the door.

 

\---:::---

In accordance with the facility regulations, Ziva escorted Hermione to the front lobby and returned for her jacket. She rounded the corner, and save for the bulge under McGee's jacket, it felt like the day before, before werewolves or witches or wands as weapons. McGee was clattering at his keyboard while DiNozzo shuffled files around his desk in a futile attempt to look busy. Then DiNozzo spoke. "So.... Interesting day. Learning new things."

McGee grunted, "That physics isn’t consistent."

"Cool, hunh?"

McGee looked up in stunned silence, then managed to drawl out, "Not really."

"You should be all over this, elf lord. Magic works, that’s wild and =="

"Tony, I'm glad you are enjoying surfing on the chaos, but I’m having a particularly bad day. You may be happy to find out that the rabbit wasn’t really in the hat, but I’m the one turning into a B-movie monster."

DiNozzo stopped grinning. "I hadn’t really forgotten that, you know."

Ziva barely heard McGee say, "Just ... enough. We both know you aren't that stupid, and I’m not up for playing along right now."

"Probie, McGee, Tim … " Tony tried until McGee actually looked up. ”Hermione’s got you."

McGee sounded surprised as he said, "Don’t tell me you believe her."

DiNozzo laughed. "I can’t even follow a sentence unless she slows down, but did you see Gibbs?"

Ziva realized what DiNozzo meant before McGee did. "Uh, no. I mean yeah, but, okay, I have no idea --."

"I did,” said DiNozzo. “You know Gibbs, and he's got this," he waved his hands around his head, "thing, this mojo and I don't know how it works, but it does. He trusts Hermione. And I trust him."

McGee closed his eyes and leaned back in his chair. "This is my life…"

DiNozzo said over him, "… he’s saved mine." McGee rubbed his eyes. Ziva knew there had to be a better way of phrasing DiNozzo's argument, but she couldn't come up with it either.

"Yeah, I guess." McGee pulled his hands from his eyes.

DiNozzo rose to stand over McGee. "Better?" he asked.

"Yeah, some."

"Good, because that’s not what I want to talk about," DiNozzo said and turned to sit on McGee's desk and face her. Ziva narrowed her eyes.

McGee said, "Oh god, what now?"

"Did you see the cowboy?" DiNozzo asked.

"Frank Calder? I pointed a gun at him, Tony."

"You were looking in the wrong direction, my friend." DiNozzo grinned.

But at least McGee sounded less worried as he played along. "Oh really. And where should I have been looking?"

DiNozzo grinned and pointed to Ziva.

"Seriously?" McGee said, his voice cracking.

If anything, DiNozzo's grin got even wider. "She scoped his butt.”

Ziva leaned back and crossed her arms, not even pretending to ignore them.

McGee said, “She was looking for concealed weaponry.” She nodded graciously at him.

DiNozzo countered, "Nah, she does that with a kind of flopped over figure eight. I know what that looks like. She scoped his ass. Well, after the figure eight thing. She lingered."

"Lingered?" McGee echoed.

"Lingered." DiNozzo affirmed, and he tapped his nose.

Abby came around the edge of McGee's desk. "Who lingered?"

DiNozzo smirked. "Ziva was scoping the cowboy."

Abby beamed. "For reals?" but at least she directed her question to Ziva herself.

Ziva decided a haughty distance wasn't doing any good. "I was doing no such thing."

Abby asked, "Why not? He is decidedly scopable. Not as much as Sheppard, mind."

"Divvying up the fresh meat, ladies?" asked DiNozzo leaning into Abby.

Ziva sneered. "We'll leave Auror Bard for you, DiNozzo."

DiNozzo put his hands in the air. "Aigh, too hairy. Sasquatch, ick."

McGee, behind him, let his head fall to the desk with a hollow thunk.

DiNozzo cringed and muttered "Sorry," but McGee waved it off as he gathered his coat and laptop case, juggling them with his bad arm. Abby fluttered to help, pulling the coat up too high and smacking McGee under the chin. She stood and waved cheerily as he took the stairs rather than waiting for the elevator, then poked DiNozzo in the chest. He grabbed her wrist and spoke quietly and seriously, "Abby, you're a scientist. How can you just accept this whole magic thing?"

She patted him on the arm and he let go of her wrist. "Oh, there's an explanation. I just don't know what it is, yet."

"Eh?"

"You tell me, Tony, how does a microwave work?"

DiNozzo's face showed the confusion that Ziva felt, but she kept her mouth shut, and he asked, "How do you go from lycanthropy to convenience food?"

Abby smiled and said, "Don't ever try to play chess with me, Tony," as she walked away.

At that Ziva pulled her jacket from her chair and left for the night.

\---:::---

Abby went in search of the elusive Tim McGee, concerned that he'd not found her yet that morning. He wouldn't admit to being worried, so she'd just have to do his worrying for him. It wasn't like anything running on Hermione's allotted counter space made any sense at all, though she thought that she could screen grab a few bits of it and make a new hobby of confusing the astrologist at Bennie's shop. Serve him right for pooh-poohing the tarot.

She bounced around the corner to hear Hermione tell Gibbs that Sheppard and Bard had found the pack's lair and that they'd be showing in a bit.

"I'd be happier if you'd just give me their cell phone numbers. Especially Calder."

Hermione laughed, "No, sir, you really wouldn't." Gibbs, to Abby's surprise, actually smiled at that, just a little, and Hermione turned to Tim. "Which reminds me, Tim, I, um, I need a bit of privacy. Is there somewhere...?"

"We can use my office downstairs," Abby volunteered.

"We can use the file room," McGee quelled. Abby made a face at him, but trotted after them. No way was she missing out on this. He unlocked the door and gestured Hermione in, then glared at Abby when she hopped in as well. But Hermione didn't shoo her out and she bounced.

Hermione tugged at the chain around her neck, pulling an ornate silver locket up out from under her t-shirt. She held it in her hand, tapped the locket with her wand and said, very clearly, "Engorgio." The locket grew to compact sized, then PDA sized, then book, then a bit larger than the laptops they used, so Abby guesstimated 15 inches across, before Hermione set it on top of a filing cabinet and opened it up and spoke to the shiny mirror inside. Abby stepped behind Hermione to see not her brown haired reflection, but a guy, maybe Hermione's age, with long white-blonde hair loose and past his shoulders. He was gorgeous, and he was also obviously drunk, holding a half full wineglass with one hand as he touched the screen on his side of the connection with the other. Abby ducked down and put both hands over her mouth so as to not squeak.

Hermione tutted. "Draco? Are you drinking?”

"It's a very special day. Are the calendars there on Mayan time or have you forgotten?"

She glanced over to the wall calendar and paled. “It’s eight in the morning here so it’s what, noon? No, one in the afternoon.” She sharpened her tone. “You’ve started early this year.”

“Nonsense, Mudblood, I started at birth. ”

“You know how very much I hate that term,” she said with no real heat.

“Ah, yes, silly me. Very well, so as to not offend your delicate sensibilities and yet still honor the day I shall call you Muggle-born for the rest of this conversation.”

“Shall I simply call back tomorrow then, when you can be civil?"

“I am being civil. I am sitting in my father’s home, undoing his work for the civil good, drinking family wine for I certainly shan’t have a son to pass it to and it is not as if I have friends.” He raised his glass in a mocking salute and gulped down the contents of the glass.

“Draco, I ... ”

“Oh, do hush and let me wallow. Actually, no, don’t hush. What can the last Malfoy do for you?”

“You are in a mood,” Hermione said. Abby agreed and wondered if she could slip out.

“Avoiding the question will not make me any more pleasant. I had the best possible teacher.”

“I have a situation here that may require direct involvement. I need my armor bag, please. ”

“You need your armor.”

“Yes.”

“I needn’t ask why.”

“No.”

“If I don’t send it, will you stay out of whatever conflict you are plunging headlong into?”

“No. I’ll simply be wearing what I can cobble together quickly.”

“The ruthlessly practical Hermione Granger has thus spoken. I am at your command." He rolled the stem of the glass between his fingers. "The black knapsack, I presume, m’lady? I mean, my Mud-gle. Or shall I call you Ridiculously Foolish Scion of the House of Heroes? Rolls trippingly off the tongue, that.”

She sighed, and Abby recognized the sound of one person in an unwinnable fight. “Yes, please. And the Chaney manuscript. It's were trouble.”

He swallowed again. “I’ll have it sought after. While you are saving the world, yet again, I will be quite occupied with toasting my illustrious father, his eminent master, and the end of the Malfoy line at the hands of its own son.” He upended the bottle over his glass, watching the dregs drip with a sneer.

“Draco…" Hermione sounded sad, and Abby stepped to where she could pat her arm, and maybe just happen to be able to see the mirror a little better, too. But really to provide comfort.

"What!" he snarled and slammed the bottle down.

“I’m sorry. I would be there under different timing. To help ...well, to help. Would Pansy...” she began.

His face twisted into something ugly, and he snarled, "Stay out of it, Mudblood." He moved the bottle to block the mirror and stood, effectively ending the conversation.

Abby asked, “How do you help? Hold his hair out of the toilet?"

“Mostly by acting as a target.” She murmured "reducio" and slipped the chain back over her head, holding the locket in her palm. “This is one of a pair, for the lord and lady of the manor. His manor. His family's, now his. That’s why the snakes." From the look on Hermione's face, Abby would have bet her mass spectrometer that there was a good deal more to explain. "When he formally registered the end of his line and dissolution of his household, he gave this one to me since almost anyone else would use it against him. I was the one person he could think of in our world who could use it and wouldn’t use him. I was neither his ally nor his enemy and one day out of the year, he remembers that."

"What did he mean, saving the world?" asked Tim.

Hermione blushed. "Long story. I'll tell you another time."

Abby unlocked the door and stepped on the top of Tim's toes just for the principle. Serve him right for eavesdropping. At least she'd openly intruded. "Will he send your stuff anyway?"

"Tomorrow he will. Or his ... assistant will tonight, after he passes out. It will arrive in time."

Gibbs walked through. "Your friends won't. We've got another crime scene, two dead. Granger, you're with me. I want to discuss protocol on the way."

\---:::---

Ziva parked the SUV behind Gibbs' car, ignoring the way DiNozzo panted and clutched the door handle of the passenger side. She nodded to Gibbs, who took the field kit from her and gave her his jacket. “Go cover her. The vultures are in flight.” Ziva walked up to the car, where Granger was sitting with the door open. Ziva leaned in, not accidentally catching the jacket at the window edge to conceal the both of them from the gawking public.

Granger snapped her fingers and a will-o-the-wisp sparkled over the back of her hand. “Bring Auror Padraig Bard to me,” she whispered and the dot of light flashed away, too quickly to track. Ziva leaned back to allow Granger to stand up.

Granger walked with her to Gibbs as Ducky pulled the van up. Two bodies, young adult, one male, one female, civilian clothing on both. They'd been eviscerated. She glanced around at the street nearby. There was a restaurant, and Ducky might as well pick up a menu, since he wasn't going to be able to determine stomach contents of either victim the normal way.

DiNozzo walked around photographing things. As he knelt over the body of the woman, he said, “Well, except for the fact that this is a woman, the pattern holds true, boss -- Marine, healthy, animal wounds. Maybe they decided it was time to find a Smurfette.”

“Except that most of her reproductive system is on the sidewalk.” Gibbs said and from the corner of her eye, Ziva could see Granger go pale.

“Actually Jethro, that’s mostly liver," offered Ducky. "Also, the pattern does _not_ hold true. First, this man was not bitten, he was raked, “ Ducky mimed clawing across his own chest, “and killed instantly. Horrific.”

“A quick death can be a mercy,” Granger said, barely loudly enough for Ziva to catch it. Ziva started scanning the crowd around them more carefully. At least she thought these people hadn't managed to develop sniper scopes. Mistletoe probably wasn't aerodynamic enough at long range.

“Hey,” McGee interjected, “a little optimism.”

“I wasn’t thinking of the Wolfsbane," Granger said. "Can you imagine the scarring?”

“Oh, yeah.”

“You wouldn’t enjoy Wolfsbane, though," she added.

“That’s why you are finding a cure,” he retorted. “Besides, when you do get the cure, you can use some of that to refine the Wolfsbane itself, if it’s so unpleasant, right? No research is ever wasted; there are always applications."

Hermione nodded as she watched Palmer manhandle the stretcher into the van. “True, very true.”

McGee continued, “With a little time and some backing, which the first successful pharmaceutical trials will buy you, maybe you can even open the window for your friend, or at least let her live a more normal life.” At her look, he added, "Abby's an efficient source of intelligence dissemination. If you want to keep something private, tell her so."

Hermione shrugged, "Saves me the retelling, I suppose. Besides… well, never mind."

"So your friend?" he prompted.

Granger didn't gentle her tone as she said, "She's dead. She got tired of mothers pulling their children to the other side of the street, couldn't face another excuse for not being hired for jobs she was overqualified to do. She waited for a full moon, sent owls to the Aurors and to Dr. Safire, then walked into a Naga den. She did enough damage in wolf form that the Aurors could finish the job the next day." She looked up and her eyes were bright. "Now that she’s dead, they’ll let her be human again."

McGee's voice was soft as he said, "Hey, it's not your fault."

Hermione was matter-of-fact when she replied, "As a matter of fact, it is."

McGee was speechless, and a shout distracted them. The uniforms were holding back Sheppard and Bard. Gibbs waved them over.

She’d missed part of the conversation, but heard McGee ask, "So why were you there?"

"I've been looking for this one for a very long time," Granger answered. "He was involved in the last battle, and his sire killed. When he was solely a wizard, he was a brutal man, sadistic."

"No, I mean why were you at the park."

"To catch him, Tim. To stop him doing harm to anyone else. To keep you safe. Bad job I did of that. Again." Granger stepped away to face Sheppard and Bard. “Two more,” she said. “But both are dead. He’s stepping up recruitment, perhaps?”

“Aye,” Sheppard said, “There’s no doubt he’s building a pack, but, if the only ones we know of are your men,” he nodded generally at Ziva, “then we’ve no idea how many others he’s got. I can't lay hands on this much Wolfsbane quickly. If he's built a full pack. We'll have to transport them back home somehow to chain them."

Granger pursed her lips, but nodded. “A portkey could do it; the Ministry can supply one.”

“Agent Gibbs!” Sheppard called, but Gibbs waved him off, so he turned to Ziva, “Have we any idea if it is just your military?”

“We ran missing persons. There are a few that fit his parameters, but not many and none of the mauled bodies have been civilians.”

“Perhaps. Mayhap. Dammit, we don’t _know_.”

“Which is why, “ Granger said, putting one hand on his arm, “we came here. To look. To learn. To answer.” She walked away, toward where Palmer was zipping a body bag. Sheppard glared, but Bard laughed at him.

Ziva pulled on fresh gloves and photographed the debris where the bodies had been found while Granger stood nearby, silently watching, holding her hands behind her back, clasping her fingers. Ziva wondered for a moment if it was a usual pose or if Gibbs had been particularly vehement about contaminating evidence on the ride over. Probably the latter. Granger put a hand on Ziva’s shoulder as she moved bracken away from something that shifted strangely in the grass. “This has been photographed?” Granger asked, and at Ziva’s nod, she pulled a white silk square out of her pocket with exactly the same care that Gibbs pulled out his gloves, and removed four sprigs of dried something from the pile of brown leaves and twigs. Ziva watched, nonplussed, as Granger rocked back on her heels, then rose.

She took the twigs to Sheppard who quite clearly said “Shite” then carefully took the square of silk without touching the plant itself, folded it over, and handed the silk wrapped bundle to Bard. Ziva narrowed her eyes. Full disclosure or not, if that was evidence, it was evidence, and she approached Bard. She pulled out a bag and held it open for him. He looked to Hermione in apparent confusion and she took the bundle from his hand and dropped it into the bag. Granger said, "If what I've heard about evidence lockers is true, though, you'll want to immerse that in running water for at least two days before you get it anywhere near any murder weapon you want to find again."

Ziva nodded and wrote, "clear with expert prior to removal" below her notes on the bag's seal, then slapped a biohazard sticker on it for good measure before setting it in the van.

DiNozzo was taking his time with the restaurant manager and Gibbs was hissing into his cell as McGee swabbed the tables and edge of the street while Granger stood over him, as far from the public side of the tape as they could get. Ziva couldn’t hear McGee, but Granger was facing her and her voice carried over the ground. "I was ten. A letter came, saying I had been accepted to a school that my parents hadn't put me up for." A pause, and she continued, "Oh, always. Harry was raised by Muggles, knew even less than I did. We were all in the same house, the same dormitory. He was mates with Ron, and they included me. Well, after the troll, anyway. Merlin, I was a ghastly know-it-all." She shook her head and grinned at him, "In charms class. I made a feather float. It was real. Magic was all real!" She rubbed her hands together for a moment. "Then, of course, there was the down side. Magic was real and so was evil. We battled against a madman, who tried to kill Harry. Regularly. " She leaned down. "What?" She straightened and looked over the street, clearly not seeing any of it. "Eleven." A longer pause, and she shook her head. "He brought so many to his cause, people who believed that he wanted to preserve the old ways, or people who did monstrous things because a madman held their children, their families, their livelihoods hostage." She crossed her arms and nodded. "Of course there were some, like Draco's father, Draco himself, at the time, who were after power." McGee asked something else, and Granger laughed mirthlessly. "Oh, Harry took care of that. We were seventeen by then."

Ziva blinked at her tone. She thought for a moment about her own seventeenth year, of training with Ari, of her father's skill as a tactician and how she had always been part of his war, the war of her people. McGee was visibly shaken by Granger's casual recounting, rocked back on his heels, showing Granger the dismay he'd always been careful to hide from Ziva herself. For a moment, she felt very alone in America. Though she thought she might have found a kindred spirit in Granger, she didn't have the words to express it, not with McGee listening in, even in the SUV. The ride back to headquarters was quiet.

She missed the silence of the drive back as she entered the morgue. Ducky and Safire were talking over one another, crowded around the tables with Gibbs and DiNozzo, while Sheppard stood against one wall, his arms crossed, as far away as he could get from the tables and yet remain in the room, and Hermione and Abby sat identically cross legged on the far counter, listening intently.

Ducky's voice brought her back to the moment. "Occam's Razor."

Sheppard raised one hand dismissively, "Not razor, claws, and not ..."

Ducky interrupted, "No, my boy, it's a ... never mind. I was thinking in the van on the way in. We are building from a wrongful assumption. These two weren't bitten, and this would be the first woman of nearly a dozen cases. That's an anomaly. Look more carefully."

Gibbs warned, "If you have something, Ducky, let's hear it."

"I'd rather someone else confirm my thought. Here, you stand there," and Ducky pulled the second body, that of the woman, up and off the stretcher so that she seemed to sit upright, her brown hair tangled around her shoulders.

Gibbs's eyes narrowed and he nodded to Ducky, then said, "Congratulations, Miss Granger, you've just earned yourself a bodyguard."

"You mean she...?" Granger's hand flew to her mouth. Gibbs went on talking behind her. "I want you people protected. Granger, Safire, that means you." He turned to Sheppard, "If you two want ..."

"Oh bollocks, no. First off, what we couldn't handle, your people couldn't either. No offense, of course. Second, we can zip off to bed and roll up the carpet behind us."

Granger added, "And they mean that quite literally, Agent Gibbs, as can I. None of us would take so rash an action as to let ourselves be taken."

Safire protested, "Speak for yourself, young lady. All very well for you to be brave, but I plan on staying right here in this building. The carpet's good enough for me."

Granger said, "Don't be silly, Cygnet. If you want to stay here, I have a tent that has enough provisions for two. But really, it won't be necessary."

Dr. Mallard said, "You've not got eyes behind you child, and you'll sleep sometime."

Abby piped up, "Clearly you've never been to one of my slumber parties."

Hermione faced her. "No, really, I don't need …"

Abby whispered loudly enough for everyone in the room to hear it, "Play along, dingbat," then spoke in a normal voice, "Big slumber party at my place, everyone can come along. I have popcorn and toenail polish."

Ziva asked, "Why would you put polish on pop ...oh, not together, then."

Abby said, "Good, you just volunteered to join us," with a smile that wasn't entirely friendly. "How about it, Gibbs? Safire can pop up Hermione's tent here in the building, and Ziva can scare off anyone who comes to bother us at my place."

Gibbs looked unconvinced, but Sheppard said from the corner. "We'll join them."

"Cool! We'll paint your toenails, too." Abby grinned, then gnawed her bottom lip, "But with five I'm a little short on couch room."

"Not a problem," Sheppard said, "We'll bring our own."

"Right," says Abby. "My place. Twenty minutes away. You can borrow my jammies."

\---:::---

The keys jangled as Abby unlocked her door. Sheppard tugged on one of the skulls and asked, "Are those real?"

"Don't be silly," she answered. "They'd break if they were; why would I carry around real skulls?"

"Why would you carry around false ones?" he asked in return and Pat laughed at them both as they tumbled into her apartment. Abby directed Hermione to the kitchen and Ziva and Sheppard to the window over the couch as Pat pulled a short flagpole out of his duffel. He looked around, "All right, where do you have a flat surface?"

"Other than the floor?" Abby looked around, seeing her own home as if by a stranger. The masks did rather poke out a bit. "How big?"

"My height and about, " he put his hands out shoulder width, "So wide."

They wound up pulling the Navajo rug off the wall behind the front door, and Pat unrolled the fabric around the rod in his hands. It was actually a bit wider than he'd said, but there was just enough room, though using the tapestry nail to hang it set it at eye level, but Abby didn't want to put another nail in the wall. He eyed it critically and tapped the front door. "Warn us, yeh, before you go leaving this open. I don't want to be walking into it."

"Ha!" she cried. "We have dvds and microwave burritos and pillows right here. There is nothing out there worth opening this door for. Besides, you can't walk out of a wall."

He grinned and swept the fabric banner he'd just hung to the side to show a room behind it. Abby heard herself gasp. Pat ducked under the bar and stepped in. "Theoretically, these are for travel, but when you travel enough, they become home." Abby hovered in her apartment as Pat puttered about, hanging up his jacket. "Dick!" he called and Sheppard appeared behind her. She moved to let him enter, too, and stood to one side, alternately pulling her hand in and out of the impossible space and patting the solid wall next to it. They moved comfortably around one another, aware of elbows and space as Sheppard pulled off his jacket and boots, toeing them under the bed, then padded toward her in sock feet.

She spun toward the couch and announced, "It's comfy pants time!"

Hermione excused herself to the bathroom, emerging moments later in an eye-searing set of sweats in brilliant gold and crimson. Ziva took the stack of clothes that Abby handed her and retreated into the bedroom. She emerged, buckling her holster over her borrowed jammies. Abby rolled her eyes, but Ziva shrugged. Abby pointed out the uniforms in the car on the street outside, but Ziva simply said, "Better safe," and touched the edge of the holster, then the inside of her left sleeve. Abby looked to Hermione for help, but Hermione had her wand close to her hand, and even Pat, lounging in the corner of the living room while Sheppard ran water in the kitchen, was careful to stay always between them and the door. Abby sighed.

"You joining us for pedicures and movie time?" she asked as Sheppard came around the corner. He looked startled and a bit wary. Pat took a mug from his hand and pushed Sheppard toward the curtain, saying, "No, my girl, we are calling it a night and leaving you to your pursuits." He handed off both mugs to her and tied a red string with a complicated knot on the front door. "Granger," he called. "I've set a seal here. Watch for it."

Hermione examined it without touching, though to Abby it just looked the Chinese knots that fastened a cheong sam. Hermione nodded. "I'll let you untangle it."

"High praise indeed," Pat grumbled, "from someone two-thirds my age," but he didn't sound too cranky as he called "ta!" and dropped the curtain behind him.

In deference to her guests, Abby switched into her Gossamer jammies in the bedroom and when she came out, Hermione grinned. "You'd have loved the Yule ball."

"Yule Ball?" she queried.

Hermione began a lengthy story with so many names that Abby lost track, but the animation on her face was something Abby didn't have the heart to quell. Ziva looked bemused.

Abby slid The Belles of St. Trinian's into the DVD player. Through the magic of microwave popcorn and girls' school heist movies, the tension in the room dropped to just edgy from downright uncomfortable and Abby had begun painting Hermione's toenails a startling, glossy black when the microwave dinged. She hopped up and zipped into the kitchen and was pulling down plates, when she heard Hermione, carefully and quietly, say to Ziva, "She's frightened, you know. This is how she deals with it."

Abby returned with a steaming platter of burritos, and Ziva hit pause on the remote.

"So, Ziva," began Abby, "what about that Calder guy? Hot? Single? Hermione, what data do you have? Spill."

Hermione laughed at Ziva's startled look. "He's a fine looking man. His reputation is honorable. Widowed, with a child, I think a son. Lives in your Montana, I understand."

Abby looked thoughtful, as Ziva replied slowly, "Perhaps there will be time for us to become better acquainted." She extended her foot towards Abby, and murmured, "The red, please."

Abby started the DVD again, and after the girls on screen took the stage and the credits rolled, they traded first kiss stories, and embarrassing date moments, until Abby realized that she'd fallen asleep, mostly on the pillow. She rubbed the crease from the remote off her cheekbone and looked up to see Ziva on guard at one end of the sofa as far from the window as she could get, and Hermione, her arms wrapped around her knees, staring at the knot on the door.

The morning was a scramble for potties and toothbrush space and Abby heard Sheppard laugh at them more than once. The guys dressed with military efficiency and cleared out not much past dawn, untying the knot on the door and rolling up their curtain with no wasted motion. They waited for Ziva to get out of jammies and back into her jeans before they left, but Hermione was slow to rise and was still sitting at Abby's desk blinking at the steam curling up from the tea that Pat had given her when Abby heard a scratch at the front door.

"Was that a knock?" Abby asked the room in general.

"That was not a knock." Ziva said and she stood to the side of the door, firearm out. Abby carefully opened the door to find a backpack with an owl sitting on it. Remarkably, it was not the strangest thing she'd faced that week.

"What's that?" Hermione came out of the bathroom with a remarkable case of bedhead.

Abby looked at the bag. The owl watched her but didn't move. "I have no idea, but apparently carrier pigeons are back in style."

Hermione leaned past her. "Oh! good!" She pulled a coin out of thin air and tossed it. The owl snapped at it, mid flight, and swooped around the corner, then into the sky. "Draco sent my bag."

"That's your armor bag. Wait, FedEx came in the night and left it to sit out there? And what's with the owl? I've never seen one come so close before." Abby was leaning out the door watching the rapidly disappearing owl. "And what was that thing you did with it?"

"Yes, of course not, and I told you he'd send it." Hermione yawned and rubbed her face, then said, "It's a thing. You know." She opened the backpack. On top of everything else was a plait of silky white hair, roughly the length of a bracelet. "And that's why he waited." She curled one leg under her and plopped on the couch, the enlarged locket balanced on her ankle. The same young man was in the mirror, but his hair was carefully braided back this morning. Hermione held up the lock of hair. "Draco, what is this?"

"In all your years of reading our histories, surely a knot's been mentioned," he snapped without any real heat.

"I know what it is, I just..." She toyed with it for a moment then said to the locket, "Thank you."

"I will be styling my hair very carefully for months, you know. Quite inconvenient."

"You could just let it show."

"I did it myself, Hermione, and was still a bit drunk, so it's not exactly inconspicuous. I know you don't understand vanity on a personal level, but one would think you could learn to anticipate it in others."

"I learned what you taught me, you great berk." She grinned like a rabbit, front teeth over her bottom lip, and he laughed. "I've never seen you make one of these for," she glanced up, "anyone else."

"Look, I like you more than the men I date." Draco's eyes dropped. "I’ve finally got you trained in how to use the library. If you die, I have to go back to depending on Winky to find my research materials. So don't die."

She laid the white plait against her left wrist and whispered. It rebraided itself neatly into a seamless knotwork circle.

Ziva snorted and vanished into the bathroom.

Draco smiled. “Good girl. When we were at school, I was the second most dangerous thing you went up against. Never forget that, Muggle-born.”

"You're in a good mood this morning."

"I broke into your stash of potions. You have an alarming number of Pepper-Ups at hand for someone who's no longer cramming for OWLS. I relieved you of a few."

"You're welcome."

"You should thank me. Vile stuff. Your potions skills are pedestrian at best."

"When it's time to restock, you may have the honors." Hermione looked steadily at the mirror and said, "Really, Draco. Thank you."

Draco met her eyes, nodded without smiling, and disconnected.

"It’s hard to tell. Are you actually friends?" asked Abby.

"He’s given me access to material that would have him imprisoned for life, shared his own food, drink and medical stores with me and instructed his house el…um…household staff to give me access to his home in his absence. I think he likes me more than he likes himself most days."

"So it’s all an act?"

“Oh no, not at all. He doesn’t like himself much. But he really hates his father. So…” She looked up and didn't quite smile. “Draco’s complicated.”

Abby let that go and pulled open her closet. As she dressed, she watched Hermione do the same out of the corner of her eye. She quit being subtle about it the second time Hermione grinned at her reflection, and she turned to poke at the stockings Hermione was pulling up. "Is that, nah, no way, chain mail would droop. Unless you've got industrial strength garters under there."

"Nope," Hermione grinned, "just a modified levitation spell and normal suspenders."

"You mean garters."

"No, I mean suspenders."

Abby decided not to press the point, "So they really are chain mail?"

"Yes, that's why they don't have feet. I couldn't find or make fine enough mail that wouldn't hurt to walk on after a while and if something is going for my toes, my boots'll turn it." She waggled one boot to show it.

"Okay, those are adorable. But they don't look safe. I've got more than one pair of steel-toed boots and we could put socks in the toes..."

"Trust me, my Fluevogs are better than your docs. Though those aren't bad, for Muggle-wear. Do me a favor, though. Wear as much silver as you've got."

Behind them, Ziva laughed. "If Abby did so, she would not be able to move."

"So what do the socks do?"

Hermione poked a finger through the toe of one ruefully. "Wool cotton blend wicks moisture, mostly. And they wear out. But they are really comfortable."

"And the skirt?" Abby pressed.

Hermione answered, "Other than the standard slimming effect of black? I like the gores instead of pleats. Easier to walk in, you know?" She zipped it and reached down for a man's waistcoat, impossibly vintage, emerald green velvet with silver embroidery, worn to the backing and slightly frayed at the waist. "I wish I had one of Ron's old sweaters. Or even Harry's," she sighed.

Abby tried to sound uninterested, and mentioned offhandedly, "You know, here in the real world, we’ve been known to keep sweaters that technically belong to ex-boyfriends."

Hermione snorted, "Where do you think that started? Besides, no go on this one. I broke up with his mother as well."

"Boyfriend sweaters have magical powers? Which one was the boyfriend?" queried Abby, eagerly.

Hermione answered, "This one's does. The work of a Mother’s hands and all that."

"Mother Helene knit me one," offered Abby.

"Wouldn't work for me, Abby, but thank you for the offer. If you were going with us, I'd insist that you wear it."

Aha! Abby thought, then said aloud, "It's a shame you don't knit."

"Oh, I do, just not as well as Molly, why?"

Abby answered, "Well, you're not his mom, but you could knit one for Draco and then borrow it."

Hermione laughed. "It's not quite the same."

Ziva said, "We need to get going."

Abby looked at Hermione, her brow arched. "Uh-huh." Abby pulled the last item from the backpack, a leather duster. Too supple to be cow, it had a golden tinge in the sunlight, but almost glittered silver otherwise, and was lined in something the color of spoiled milk with designs painted on it. “Oh, this is gorgeous. Is that silk, lining the coat?"

"Yep." Hermione nodded. "Painted with the blood of virgins.”

Abby glanced to Ziva who was doing her poker face, no help there. She turned to Hermione and asked, “Seriously?” Ziva winked at Hermione, who laughed.

Hermione caught her breath and said, “No, don’t be silly, what good would a virgin be? The ink is mixed with powdered turtle shell, though.”

"Mine feels so boring, plain old cow, what is that? Snakeskin? No way can it be eel."

"No. We need to get going. If you want to wear it over there, you can."

An hour later, Abby was still wondering just what the duster was made of. Hermione didn't seem to want to actually wear it around, so they switched for the ride, the sleeves of her plain black leather duster coming to Hermione's fingertips, which was odd since Hermione's duster fit Abby perfectly, buttoned easily, hit right at the waist, and was exactly the right length to flare out when she walked, so she swaggered into the office, twirling imaginary guns. Sheppard did a classic Tex Avery double take when he saw it and said, "What is that? Is that... They're sentient, you know."

"I know," Hermione answered. "It's borrowed. An antique, duly registered with the Ministry." She shook off Abby's own coat and folded it over a chair.

"Not in your name."

"No, it's on loan from the owner." Hermione pulled her hair back into a band and continued, "Look, I can't go back in time and save it from being killed and skinned, but it's better armor than that." She nodded at the kevlar that Tony was wrapping around himself.

Sheppard shook his head. "It should be destroyed."

Hermione answered, "You'll forgive me if I want that sacrifice to have some meaning."

Sheppard snarled, "That's not a soldier's attitude."

Gibbs drawled from one side of the room, "Maybe not in your military."

Sheppard turned to face him, saying, "I'm not comfortable with her going along on this at all."

Tony added, "Maybe he's got a point. Look, I know you want to go, but...."

Hermione stood, "No, you are going in with bullets and wolfsbane; these are men, Agent DiNozzo, not monsters."

Sheppard snarled, "Once they've turned, that's exactly what they are, Granger."

She raised her voice, "No --"

Tony stepped forward. "Look, we understand, okay, Abby told us about your friend, the one that was bitten."

Hermione looked grim. "She only told you what I told her. There's a bit more to the story than she knows."

"I've seen crime scenes that would haunt you ..." Tony said.

Abby realized that the three of them had backed Hermione up against Ziva's desk and she stepped forward to smack Tony to make him realize that he needed to shut up already. Sheppard snarled, "These are monsters, girl. I know you're called a war hero, but we both know you spent most of that in research. Now I'm not saying that you aren't--."

"Aren't what?" Hermione said, carefully not shouting, her words clipped and her jaw tight.

Sheppard growled, "You don't understand what these things can do!"

Hermione, trapped by the desk behind her, snarled back, "Don't I? There _are_ monsters, but there are victims, and by dooming all of them, we imprison not only the monsters like Fenrir who chose to attack a school in order to make the front page of the Prophet, but also those who dare to defy him, who stand with no more than a wand and a silk blouse to buy time for twenty pre-schoolers to scramble out the fire exit. You damn a 23 year old girl, blocking a deliberate attack with nothing but her body and the heart of a red and gold lion.” She smacked Tony hard on his vest and Abby pulled him backward. Hermione used the space to slide off the desk away from Sheppard to the wall, shaking her head.

Tony gave the nervous laugh that he thought was a tension breaker, and said "Wait a minute, lions, now? Lions and werewolves and bears, oh my." He looked around to see if anyone would laugh with him, but Gibbs just rolled his eyes as Sheppard glanced over to Bard.

"Don't make me pull rank to keep you safe, Granger. Leave it to us. This isn't your fight," Sheppard snarled.

"Not my fight?" Abby saw Hermione go white, then red, as she dropped her wand out of her sleeve, ripped free a hair, then drew a silver cord from between her eyes before throwing both into the air and spinning her wand in a circle around them.

Abby fell into step behind Hermione as she walked up to a cottage out of fairy tale illustration. She called out; Hermione didn't answer, but moved at a careful pace, so Abby could catch up, could see the card in Hermione's hand, a black and white photo of a young woman holding an apple in one hand, grinning sheepishly as she gestured to the cottage behind her. Inside of the card in a loopy cursive was an invitation to tea, along with induction into the Ron Weasley Ex-Girlfriend's Club. The cottage in the photo was quaint and cute, while the one in front of them was a crime scene, with the door ripped free of its hinges, half splintered sections at their feet forcing Hermione and Abby, as her shadow, to step over them, carefully not touching the sides with shards of wood hanging, and now falling, in front of her.

Abby thought she saw Tony and Jimmy Palmer with them, transparent like an over-recorded image or a reflection, to the side and behind Hermione, but was distracted when Hermione lost her balance, throwing a hand out to catch herself. Abby looked down to see Hermione's boots slip in the blood on the floor.

A doll lay to their left, mewing 'mama' endlessly as blood soaked into its hair. One wall was painted with polka dots; orange, blue, green, and red circles were mixed with the spatter of darkening red that dripped down them, drawing their attention with gory lines to the floor, to the mangled body of a child, her eyes open and her face wet, broken and discarded. Books were still shuddering off the waist-high shelves under a window, and a beam of light came through the broken glass cut the chalkboard in two, bisecting a large capital A. The same beam of light, knife edged, divided a bloody footprint the size of her palm into light and dark.

Hermione walked through the blood, and some part of Abby, the small part that hadn't curled into a ball to sing lullabyes to itself, worried about evidence contamination and noted that the blood was only starting to get tacky, barely beginning to dry.

They followed the screams of the children and the shouts of adults, coming up on the final scene, the half-strength image of Tony leading them out the same way the children had escaped. Palmer's ghost stayed near the splintered door, staring at the floor. Men in robes appeared in the clearing behind the school with a noise like a child's cork gun, a dull pop, one after another, as other men, also in robes, filthy with blood and leaves and torn bits flapping, stumbled out of the woods before her, some carrying children clinging to their robes.

Abby realized that Hermione had left her and saw her nearing a woman sprawled on the ground. She called "Harry!"

The young man crouched beside her looked up and said, "Hermione, thank god. Take her, will you? I need to get someone from St. Mungo's." Abby registered his unruly black hair, his robes, not quite the quality of Sheppard and Bard's, his youth, and the lightning shaped scar on his forehead. He stepped away and popped out of sight.

Abby stood over Hermione, who had dropped the invitation to kneel next to the woman in the photo, the one who had to be Lavender Brown, breathing too rapidly, with blood bubbling out of her mouth. Abby looked past her to see four Aurors using their cloaks to hoist a figure, too big to be human, out of the woods, dropping it unceremoniously to the ground while another Auror more carefully brought out the body of the little brown haired girl from inside, gently laying her next to another cloak wrapped bundle. At her feet, Hermione held Lavender's hand, telling her that the children were safe, that Lavender had stopped him long enough to get them out. She was watching the edges of the invitation seep up muddy water when she was pulled back into the office, gasping for breath and blinking her eyes clear to register Patrick's fist holding the back of her coat.

Sheppard had both hands in Hermione's vest and was shaking her, holding her up off the ground, not even speaking, obviously furious. Hermione kicked out at him and dropped to the ground, landing on one knee, then looked up, her eyes darting around the room, at the tears that Abby could feel on her face, at Tony's shaking hands, and she shoved past Abby to run from the room.

Abby felt for the brick of the wall behind her and found only desk. She leaned on it, panting, as Sheppard lunged toward Hermione, but Pat grabbed his arm. Sheppard stopped but snarled. Pat leaned in, whether to show his size advantage or just to make sure that Sheppard made eye contact, Abby couldn't tell, and said, "I'll follow you into hell, but not after her." Sheppard snarled and cursed, but after several breaths, he calmed and nodded and only then did Pat let go of him.

Dr. Safire sounded winded as she said, "That was.... Was that?"

"It certainly seemed to be," Sheppard answered, and Tony cocked his head, his eyes shadowed, looking as confused as Abby felt. "Though how, without tools or ..."

"Not just that," wondered Bard, "but to do so with no preparation? To pull in observers without consent, and a room full of them at that?"

Gibbs asked, "Are we missing something?"

Pat looked to Sheppard, who spoke slowly, “She shouldn’t have been able to do that.”

Tony piped up, "Wasn't it magic? Your photos move. This was just, being in the movie. Okay, granted, being in an incredibly disturbing movie, but still..."

Sheppard cut him off with a gesture, "No. She created a temporary pensieve with no time and no tools, nothing but a strand of memory and force of will."

"A pen-what?" asked Tony.

Gibbs slapped the back of Tony's head and gestured at Sheppard to continue. "And that’s unusual?"

Sheppard ran his fingers through his hair, "I couldn’t do it. Nor Pat. Yesterday, I'd have said it couldn't be done. Not by ... well, not by anyone alive, anyway. Merlin knows what else she's found at the Manor."

"Just be glad that it wasn’t complete." Pat sounded tired and grim.

"Felt pretty complete to me," Tony observed and Abby couldn't help but agree.

Pat shook his head. "We should have been able to see one another, for a start. Also the memory itself was missing the other senses. Normally they have scent. We should have been able to smell the chalk, and fresh blood smells like ..."

Abby saw Jimmy, in the corner, go pale. Gibbs must have seen it, too, since he interrupted, "We know," but Jimmy swallowed, hard, and left the room in a hurry. Abby could sympathize. Evidence came into her lab in bags. Seeing terrified children covered with fresh blood was a world away from running ballistics tests under fluorescent lights.

Tony was talking again. "Guess it’s a good thing she’s on our side, eh?"

Pat and Sheppard looked at one another and that made Abby a little nervous. It was painfully obvious that they were carefully not saying something, but Sheppard had seemed so angry when he'd shaken Hermione.

Safire said, "She _is_ on our side, gentlemen."

Tony didn’t notice or didn't care; he smacked Tim on the good shoulder and grinned, "Told you you were in good hands. Worrywart.”

But Abby was on the other side of the room, so she could hear Sheppard lower his voice, urgent and still a little angry, as he asked Safire, "Do you know of anyone ... anyone now alive, who could drag half a dozen people into a memory with nothin' but this?" He waved at the strand where it was hanging, impossibly, in mid air. It started to fall and he slid a folder under it, careful not to touch it directly, as though the shining silver were mercury. "She's been doing a lot of research in the Malfoy library and you don't know what wickedness is in there."

Safire looked down at the folder, but she put her hands behind her. "Neither do you, Auror," she said. "Or what useful information may lurk amid the shadows." He conceded the point with a shrug, and Safire continued, "but I do know this: she means well."

"Don't we all," he said, clearly unhappy. "Check for reactions, please." Safire stepped to Tony, peered into his eyes, and murmured something. Pat found an empty Styrofoam cup and brought it over; Abby watched carefully as Sheppard tipped the silver thread off the manila file into it. "Pat, that must be when she left the Ministry."

"Yeah, that's right. She gave the one interview to the Quibbler."

"Interview?"

"You were in St. Mungo's; 'twas after the giant migration."

Sheppard grunted in some macho affirmation, then slapped Pat in the chest with the file folder, "You sure about this?"

Pat grinned, "Yes, mother."

Sheppard frowned, "Pat, I'm serious. We could still owl Calder. I won't risk..."

"Into Hell, Richard."

Sheppard blinked and said, "Aye." He glanced down at the cup and shook his head, but he looked up again and smiled at Pat, grabbed his neck, and pulled him forward to knock foreheads. "Aye." Abby could hear the clack of their skulls, but they were both grinning.

Abby ran the back of her hand across her cheeks and stepped forward, "I'll just go check on her, okay? What's that?"

Sheppard rolled his eyes and walked away, but Pat said, "The memory itself."

She reached out to take the cup and asked, "So if I pour it down the drain or something, she won't have it anymore?"

Padraig held on for a moment, then said, "That's not your choice" before he let go.

Abby couldn't keep from holding the Styrofoam with its poisonous cargo at arm's length while she went in search of Hermione. She found her in the bathroom, washing her face. Hermione looked up into the mirror and said to Abby's reflection, "Gryffindor is the House of Heroes. Whatever that means."

"Good guys and bad guys," Abby said. She set the cup on the sink. "Usually."

Hermione fingered the silver snake embroidered on her vest. "Something like that."

\---:::---

Tim adjusted the headset and his holster, comfortable with neither, though not nearly as uncomfortable as both Aurors seemed to be with the headsets when they'd fitted them in the van. It was as though neither had seen anything more modern than a Victrola before, he thought, and mocked himself quietly. They were doing as well at adapting to his world as Tony would to theirs. He thought of Hermione's crystalmod steampunk laptop but his thoughts were interrupted by the hiss of reception.

"All clear," Ziva's voice was muffled, or she was whispering.

She and Gibbs had gone the long way around, while Tim waited with the two strangers and Tony, who was apparently teaching rock-paper-scissors-lizard-Spock to Bard. Now they piled out of the van and edged toward the waterfront.

The docks were in active use, but this section hadn't been upgraded with RFIDs and cameras. Too far from the main gates and gas tanks to be in demand by the trucking companies, and at the inland edge of the yards, this section was a dead zone. Although it was part of one of the busiest cargo transfer points of the region, the warehouse here was used only for overflow and not even on the more current records. Skoll and his pack had been hiding in plain sight and might have gone on doing so for years.

When Sheppard and Bard had brought the news to the office, Gibbs had given them his scary you'd-better-have-done-ALL-the-research look and asked about the best way in. Hermione had started to explain about wards, which fascinated Tim, but to his disappointment Gibbs had cut her detailed explanation short and demanded a map with color coding. The closest entrance was mined and guarded and the Aurors paled at the name of the protections there, so Gibbs hadn't even asked. They'd be going in the long way around, coming in from the commercial side, over cargo lanes, and then cutting back inward, inside the fence line and the wards Hermione had spotted. Part of the run was in open space, all sea level and concrete jetties and still wooden docks with a wide open field of fire, while the other was in confinement of rows of identical tilt wall warehouses, claustrophobic and labyrinthine. Both were troublesome and Tim touched his kevlar vest with no real faith.

They split up at Sheppard's suggestion, "re-partnered" to confuse the alarms that Skoll had set. Tim didn't get why two pair of feet weren't two pair of feet, but Gibbs had agreed and that was it. So Tony and Sheppard were twenty feet in front of Bard and Tim when Hermione, in the van, said something that Tim couldn't make out and Gibbs yelled "Down!" in his ear.

Bard grabbed the back of his vest and pulled so hard it felt like a tow chain yanking him backward. Tim wound up on his butt on tide-wet planks, Bard standing over him, his wand out, muttering. His accent was so broad that Tim couldn't tell if he was saying a spell in the outlandish Latinate language that Hermione used or just talking to himself. But he could see the effects.

The dock in front of Tony and Sheppard exploded outward in green and orange fire. The orange took shape like the Night on Bald Mountain, reaching for the two agents. Tony shoved Sheppard out of the way and into the water. The fire hit Bard's barrier and curled back on itself, but not enough—it was still expanding. Tony dove over the edge after Sheppard and into the oil-slicked water. The orange fire retreated, compressing and swirling into a muddy miasma, and finally imploded, taking a large chunk of the dock with it.

Pat jogged up to where Tony'd thrown one arm over the concrete piling that still stood. "Tha' was right nasty," he said, and hauled Tony out of the water by the back of his vest, straight up. Tim steadied him as Tony tried to shake his shirt back down from his armpits. Pat reached a hand down to Sheppard, grinning as he came out of the water. They continued in a standard tactical leapfrog, guns covering wands and back in turns, to the nearest warehouse, and Tony leaned against the concrete wall, shaking one leg.

"Blood and Balls, I'm soaked." Sheppard spluttered.

"And your shirt's ruined, it is." Bard's quiet response rumbled with an undertone of laughter.

"Shite, that's two in one week."

"Actually, it's three." Bard was positively smirking.

"The white one doesn't count. I'm not charging it to the Ministry."

Tony chimed in, "Tell me about it. At some point, you just quit mentioning it. I'm going to get my chops busted for putting dry cleaning on an expense report again."

Sheppard and Bard shared a glance. "Nah, s'just that one weren't exactly ruined in the line of duty," Sheppard said.

Bard waved his wand, "Hold still, both of you - Scourgify. Reparo. That'll hold, just don't try to transfigure it."

"Can you get the water out?"

"Could, but won't."

"Pat."

"Fine," Bard answered, "But I reserve the right to dunk both of you after. For purely artistic reasons."

Tim didn't hide his grin at that, and Bard smiled as he muttered something and waved his wand again. A cloud of steam fogged from both of them. Sheppard rolled his neck and shook himself. Tony shuddered more extravagantly, said, "That wasn't ... that wasn't entirely pleasant," and shot Tim a dark look.

Tim protested, "What'd I do?"

They could see Gibbs, some thirty feet away, but his voice was in Tim's ear, growling, "Well, that blew any chance at surprise."

Tony protested, "I thought we were hidden from the locals."

Hermione answered, "Only from your kind. I'm afraid we weren't going to sneak up on Skoll and his pack no matter what we tried. Agent Gibbs, we are now at Plan B."

Tim couldn't hear any hesitation as Gibbs answered, "Understood. We are clear of radio silence. Shut up anyway."

A cloud, backlit orange like a sunset, floated over the section of docks they were in. Wooden crates littered the area, far too close to get a forklift through and providing too much cover. They weren't walking into a trap so much as dancing into it, but they kept up the pretense anyway, covering one another, he and Tony with weapons drawn, Pat and Sheppard with their wands, as they opened the smaller back door to the warehouse and entered. It didn't do them any good whatsoever. Tim was near one wall and headed toward the main door, worried about the catwalk that ran over his head and across the empty space, when the lights came up and the shadows around him coalesced into men, unarmed, but holding themselves as the weapons they were.

The one standing over him showed his teeth and pointed. Tim raised his weapon and heard a growl to his left. Tim lowered his weapon and the guy above him pointed toward the door. Tim checked around the corner first, force of a habit that no one else would appreciate and saw Gibbs and Sheppard at the edge of a cleared space facing three men, but surrounded by unarmed Marines standing on boxes, watching, waiting. Tim thumbed the safety and holstered his sidearm; he knew, in his gut, in his blood, that the guns weren't effective weapons. Not enough. Maybe with C4 they could do this. He glared at the leader, the Brit with long hair, incongruous and anachronistic next to the shorn Marines he'd built his pack of, and Tim felt himself growling. He shook himself back into civility.

One of the werewolves swung down, impossibly lithe, from the ladder to the catwalk, a bundle over his shoulder. He leaned forward and tipped the bundle to the floor in front of the door, and Tim recognized Tony, bleeding and broken but breathing, too limp to be conscious. Tim wondered where Ziva was, hoped she had a shot at the leader, who was walking up to Gibbs, with the other two men beside him. One was young, a fresh scar across one cheek and under his eye. The other had career military over him like a neon sign, no taller than Gibbs, his hair still in the high and tight but showing a lot of grey, calm blue eyes with laugh lines in the corners. He wasn't laughing now.

The mean-looking British guy with shaggy hair exaggeratedly examined Gibbs, then said, "Mudbloods and Aurors working together. What _has_ the world come to?" He laughed, ending with a growl. "You're no threat to me. Deal with him." As he walked away, Tim heard Gibbs say the letter H into his mike, then Hermione answer "Bee." Skoll didn't seem to hear the exchange, as he stepped over Tony, and pushed open the door. He stood for a moment, sniffing the air, backlit against the afternoon sky, the sudden light spilling into the warehouse disconcerting. The door closed with a bang, followed by a shout then a pair of screams, one high pitched and panicky, the other animalistic. Tim twitched, but a growl from above kept him frozen, watching Gibbs and the two men, no, not men, the two were, that Skoll had left. Tim recognized both of them from the Missing Persons files. So did Gibbs, since he called them by name.

"Sergeant Temple," Gibbs said, his voice calm, "You are a member of the United States Marine Corps. What are you thinking, taking orders from him?"

Temple stepped forward, "You don't ... I’m a fucking werewolf, gunny."

Gibbs shrugged. "Doesn’t matter. You are a Marine." They both looked at him in disbelief. "The Corps hasn't left you. We take care of our own."

Temple looked over at Baker, looked around the room, then looked to Gibbs and deliberately came to attention. He saluted. "Sir, yes sir."

Gibbs looked up at the others stationed around the room and raised his voice. "Is anyone in this room not a Marine?"

Baker sneered at Temple, still holding the salute, and snarled, "I was a Marine, but now I’m not." He growled and Tim's heart raced. Would he sound like that, more animal than human?

Gibbs shook his head. "You know better than that, son." He said it quietly, almost sadly.

Tim could hear, not the echo of Baker's growl, but new ones, from points around the room, up on the catwalk, from the floor behind Gibbs. Baker showed his teeth.

So did Gibbs.

Baker jumped forward, reaching for Gibbs. Tim didn't have time to draw and shoot before Temple snapped to the side. The were-Marine grabbed Baker out of mid air, punched his stiffened hand through Baker's throat, and pulled it back out. Before Tim could breathe, Temple dropped a fist sized chunk of Baker's esophagus at Gibb's feet, then carefully stiffened and returned to his salute, Baker's blood dropping off his hand and onto his shoulder, Baker's corpse, still twitching, lying between Gibbs and Temple.

"Semper Fi, sir," Temple said.

Tim heard a shuffling from around them and he was conscious of the gun in his hand at last. Too slow; his reactions were too slow to compete with this lot. He glanced at the rest of the pack; one of the four he could see was saluting along with Temple. All of them were watching Gibbs. Gibbs wasn't looking anywhere but at Temple.

Gibbs saluted crisply, and Temple dropped into parade rest, spattering blood on the concrete.

"Stand down, Marines," Gibbs called out. "David, check DiNozzo. McGee, find Granger and the others." Tim holstered his weapon and headed for the main loading door.

Tim stepped out of the door to slide to a stop with a crossbow at his chest. He heard himself say "eep!" and winced. Safire lowered the crossbow and stepped around Tim hurriedly, probably spotting Tony on the ground behind him.

Hermione sat in the back of the open van, and Tim sat down next to her. She was bleeding sluggishly from a cut over one ear and the hair there was matted with blood. "Hey," he said. She looked up in acknowledgement. "Plan B, hunh?" he asked.

She raised one corner of her mouth, but he wasn't sure he could call it a smile. "Gibbs didn't like Plan A."

"Skoll?"

"With Calder, held by the Americans to be turned over to the British Ministry of Magic. That was never negotiable."

"So that was Plan A. Plan B comes in..."

"Where Calder dumps Skoll on the Aurors alone so we can see if we've got any others like you before they immobilize him and get here. Skoll's been portkeyed over, and isn't in the best of moods, I would guess. Which is good, since the longer he fights, the more time he's buying me." The main door clattered up and Gibbs and Temple, still painted with Baker's blood, carried Tony toward the van. Hermione grabbed an NCIS duffel from the pile of Ducky's equipment and walked toward the warehouse door.

Tim helped Gibbs pull Tony, still unconscious, into the back of the van. Ziva swore he hadn’t been bitten, and Gibbs growled, "We aren't doing the EMT route again. Ziva, drive him to the ER and babysit. Call me when he's released. Granger, Safire, what do you need?"

Hermione was sitting on a camp stool with an antique table beside her. Squares of silk were stacked, spilling a bit, on one corner. Instead of the neatly hemmed white silk she'd used at the crime scene, these were a riot of color, and suddenly Tim knew why Abby'd been sent to the local Goodwill earlier that day. A handful of silk scarves, remnants of conspicuous consumerism from the eighties, had been cut into five inch squares, waiting for a splash of gore and a tap of Hermione's wand. He stood and watched, growing numb, as the Marines filed by, each getting a slice to the hand and a glimpse of their fate in gory miniature, then a bright blue bandage from Safire whether they protested or not. The ones who showed both man and wolf were sent to stand by him; the ones who bled only the wolf circled around Gibbs.

The line before Hermione dwindled to two, then one. McGee stood with two Marines beside him. Gibbs raised his voice to include them along with the eight milling around him.

"Listen up." They stilled, and Gibbs spoke, "I won't lie. There is a drug that may or may not work. But either way, it won't work on you."

Tim could see Temple rub the back of his neck, and one of the younger ones spoke up, "Guess we're out of the Corps after all, huh gunney?"

"You aren't dead yet, son. You're reassigned to Wolf Company." The two men by Tim were overtly eavesdropping which made him feel a little better about doing the same. Gibbs went on, "You were recruited to be a fighting force. Skoll didn't do that; you did, every one of you."

The kid piped up, "But Skoll said ..." he looked to Temple, who shook his head once.

"He said you were monsters? Not human anymore? Better than human?" Gibbs guessed.

The kid looked to Temple. Gibbs looked to Temple. Temple looked at the ground. "Sergeant...?" Gibbs invited clarification.

Temple looked at the men around him, and drawled, "Gunney, I reckon we were told a whole lot of bullshit. I'm willing to listen to someone else." He shifted his weight and Tim could see the kid next to him stiffen.

"Dr. Safire can tell you a bit more tomorrow, but the basics are this: three nights a month, you don't get a choice. The were will hurt any human; the wolf is too animalistic to be let loose without control. So three nights a month, you spend confined to a room, sicker than any dog should ever be. That's where you'll be going tomorrow: to safety, not for you, but for everyone else. She's working on a way to make it easier, but for now, it's what it is. That's three nights out of thirty. The rest of the time, you do what we do. Improvise, adapt, overcome.”

Tim startled as the assembled men shouted out "Oorah", including the two right next to him. They moved forward, to rejoin the others, and Tim backed up. He already knew more about werewolves that he ever cared to, and might well be spending the rest of his life learning still more. He leaned against the van, watching Gibbs talking to the pack on one side and Hermione clearing off her improvised testing lab to the other. She piled the paisley and plaid and floral sections of silk into a metal trash can at her feet, mixing the used and unused sections. She was silent, so Tim didn't realize at first that her hands were shaking because she was crying, and when she waved her wand at the can at her feet, it spit only sparks. Pat stepped up behind her as though from the shadows and a stream of blue fire spat from his wand. Hermione sniffed and said, "Thank you. I don't usually..."

Bard patted her on the shoulder, "Don't be. Now's your only chance. Couldn't take the time before and you won't have the luxury later."

Tim flinched so hard his head banged against the van when Sheppard shouted, "Gibbs! Incoming!" directly into the headset that Tim'd failed to turn off. He pulled it off his ear and peered around the door of the van. Calder in his sheepskin coat had his Colt out and a dozen others in what looked like choir robes appeared with a series of cracks, wands out and circling the cluster of Marines. Gibbs stepped up and snarled, "Put your weapons down."

Calder hesitated, then slowly holstered his weapons. The others looked to him and the ring of wooden sticks slowly lowered. The hair on Tim's neck stood straight up as the low growl of the Marines became audible. One of the newcomers stepped forward and Calder bared his teeth in what might have been a smile, if it had been friendly. "Chief Auror Lot."

"Officer Calder," The man in robes sneered. "As much as I should say that I appreciate your presence, I do not need your assistance."

"No." Calder tucked one thumb into his jeans pocket, but his careless slouch didn't look any more at ease than Tim felt. "But I'm not here to help you out." Gibbs stood before the pack of Marines, his arms crossed, watching. Calder continued, "Skoll was portkeyed into your custody as agreed, Auror Chief."

"Strangely," Lot glared at Hermione next to Tim, "the pack wasn't."

"And they won't be. See, we've decided that we are going to deal with this domestically."

"Don't be a fool. You don't have training in werewolves."

"Your rule is to poison them. Dunno that we need help from England to do that."

"There is no other way. Granger's research is a waste of time. Your weakness will spill the blood of your own citizens. Unless you plan on killing them all immediately." Lot nodded towards the Colt. "I believe that is the usual method here for dealing with them."

Calder cocked his head to one side and glanced at Gibbs. "Nah, we got talked into trying something new. I'll be taking command of Wolf Company."

"Officer Calder, your men," Gibbs declared. Lot and his aurors looked uneasy and half of them were toying with their wands. "Temple, front and center." Temple stepped up, skepticism drawn broad on his face. Calder nodded to him, then took a breath and shifted, pulling and stretching into a Great Dane, a breed Tim knew was larger, faster, and outweighed any of the were present.

"Hermione!" he gasped.

One of the marines blurted, "Sonofabitch!" and the wolfhound bared his teeth at him.

"Oh!" Hermione said. "He _is_ an animagus. That's why .." She looked to Safire, who was carefully watching Calder stalk forward.

Tim started to think of impossible things to contemplate before breakfast. "I thought that--," he started. "You didn't tell me that there was a.--"

"Werewolf pack in law enforcement?" she said. "That's because there wasn't. Your Gibbs came up with the idea. He's ...um... he's kind of ..."

"Yeah," Tim answered. "He can be."

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw one of the Aurors glance around, then break ranks and head for Hermione. She looked up and grinned, jumping up to throw her arms around him with a glad cry of "Harry!"

The young Auror grinned back. "Was this your doing?"

She ducked her head and grinned. "Not completely. I mean, yes I told Safire about Remus and Prongs and all, ages ago, when we first started, in fact, but I didn't consider actually doing anything on this scale. But she told Ducky and well, they didn't know that it can't be done. So they are going to try it."

"Do you think it'll work?"

"Oh, I hope so." She shook her head. "And at least they can, well, you know, not be alone."

"Oh, and speaking of alone..." He punched her, none too gently on the shoulder. "When we saw just the one come through the portkey, Hermione...."

"Oh, you know how no plan ever goes completely right."

"Your plans never fail."

"Says the man who didn't spend most of Christmas hols with whiskers and pointy ears."

"And you learned your lesson then. What's the actual story?"

Tim stood and stepped from the shadows, and Hermione seized the distraction. "Harry, do come and meet Agent McGee. He's been ever so helpful with the whole ... " she waved one hand in the air to indicate the pack, the warehouse, or possibly the Americas, for all Tim knew.

Harry the Auror turned to him and smiled, saying "Any friend of our Hermione is a friend to us all," before glancing back over his shoulder. "Look, I've got to go help, but, seriously Hermione, owl me."

"I promise, as soon as I can, as soon as I have something to tell you, I will, Harry, really I will."

Tim stood next to Hermione and waved goodbye, a trifle foolishly, he thought He shifted his attention back to Calder, who was back to his usual self and had the were holding onto what looked like a tug-of-war rope. A minute later, they all disappeared. He held Hermione's satchel open as she tapped the table into a pack of cards and dropped it in. "So, Harry's another school friend?"

"Hmm?" she said as she carefully wrapped standard test tubes in a wool shawl and laid them in as well. "Yes, my best friend. Well, my other best friend, though Ron's I guess not a best friend anymore, or at least not for ...oh, it's complicated."

"Ah, I understand," Tim said, and thought, well, hell. Clearly he needed to brush up on semaphore. He'd been getting the wrong signals again.

\---:::---

Abby, trailing gauze, ran upstairs to meet them. "I brought my own first aid kit so don't...wait. Where's Tony?

Gibbs pulled Hermione's hair back, frowned when he saw the blood matted behind her ear, then pushed her into Tony's desk chair. "The ER."

Abby gasped, "You left him there?"

Gibbs set his weapon into the desk drawer. "Ziva's with him. We might have made do with a wrap and slap, but I'm a little unhappy with our EMTs at the moment." He glared at Hermione.

Ducky hustled into the room and said, "Oh good, you are back. Were we successful?"

Sheppard pulled his coat off, taking part of his shirt sleeve with it. He stuck a finger into the rip and made a face at Bard, then turned to Ducky and said, "Your man Gibbs there alphaed a werewolf."

Ducky said, "But of course." At both Aurors' reaction, he grinned, "I would have expected nothing less." Pat laughed, while Sheppard muttered something under his breath, but the only word Abby could make out sounded suspiciously like insane, and Ducky continued, "I actually was looking for you, Abby. Dr. Safire needs a sanctified space for her experiments. Do you perhaps know of an abandoned church?"

Safire interrupted, "Preferably one outside the city limits. I'd rather not do this in a populated area, in case...well, in case."

"Most of the churches I know of that aren't being used as churches are clubs. Wait, does it have to be Western?"

"No, but we'll waste time in trying to find anything that isn't marked."

"Not if you know what you are looking for," said Sheppard, and he popped out the steampunk compact that he'd been holding in the tape of the crime scene where Tim was bit. It looked like a compass with no markings.

Abby cooed, "Oh! Gadgets?!"

Gibbs pulled her out of the way to look for himself. "How does that thing work?

Sheppard paused, then said, "Do you want the philosophy or the instructions?"

Ducky laughed. "Gibbs is a practical man; let's have the instructions."

Sheppard handed over the contraption. "Hold it and want something, let it fill your mind." The arrow swung wildly. They watched it flail for a moment, then Sheppard asked, "What on earth are you thinking of?"

Gibbs grimaced. "Never mind. It needs to be something concrete?"

"That's simplest," Sheppard answered. "Think of your vehicle." The arrow spun wildly then snapped toward the eastern wall.

Ducky cooed and grabbed it from Gibbs' hands just as Abby was reaching for it. The arrow on the compass jumped left, then right, then back to the left, not erratically, but as though Ducky were challenging it, switching requests as quickly as he got an answer. He was clearly playing, so Sheppard took it away with an indulgent smile at her. She tried not to pout. Much.

Patrick continued, "But it doesn't have to be a known quantity. You can describe something and let it guide you."

Gibbs asked, "What about 'Where's the murder weapon?' "

Pat shook his head, "Nah, T'would only work on muggles or idiots. A simple _confundus_ or the right mix of herbs defeats it, so it's not much use for anyone old enough to commit a crime. Otherwise we'd have tracked the lair the easy way and saved ourselves the shoe leather. But it'll help us find a site that meets the doctor's requirements, if she can focus."

"What if you don't specifically ask an answerable question?" Ducky asked.

"Then it pretty much just goes to whatever is on the top of your mind," Pat answered, then glanced down. Sheppard was holding it loosely and gazing out the window. The arrow shifted to track Pat as he leaned over. He rolled his eyes and growled, "Focus on the job." He pulled it from Sheppard's hands and snapped it shut, while Richard grinned into his chest, not in the least repentant.

\---:::---

Tim pulled up the satellite image and clicked it over to the main monitor. "The road comes to an end here, but the spot that Agent Bard thinks would work best is actually back here," he gestured, moving the cursor over the screen, "close to this bend."

Sheppard put his thumb on the scale marker at the bottom of the map, then moved his hand under the arrow. "Aye, more than big enough. Dr. Safire, where do we stand on the cure?"

Safire shook her head and said, "We have a bit of a problem. I need today to prep, but I can't imbue the final solution until sunset tomorrow.

Gibbs asked, "Won't that be too late?"

Safire nodded. "I need just a few hours of tomorrow after sunset to do this. But yes, it may well prove too long past sunset."

Tony said loudly, "We are off by one day? You've got to be kidding me."

Tim shook his head. "We need a Tardis," he said, expecting the reference to pass over everyone's head as usual.

Hermione answered, "Even the Malfoy's haven't another Time Turner, and I can't bend time on my own."

Abby mused, "Why not chase the sun?"

Tim asked, "How would that work?"

Tony retorted, "What, they don't have time zones in World of Warcraft?" and Tim made a heroic effort to keep from flashing an obscene gesture at him.

Hermione asked, "Dr. Safire, could we Apparate them to London, then China, stay ahead of the moon, buy us a day?"

Safire blinked at her in disbelief. "You must be tired, girl; that's a particularly daft suggestion. If that’s all it took, don’t you think there’d be werewolves doing so every month? The infection is exhausting, and if you start to transform in route, you’ll splinch and spread yourself over the countryside."

Tim asked, "Splinching is bad?" Hey, he might as well learn what he could.

Safire nodded, "If you don’t have someone nearby to help, it’s an ugly way to kill yourself."

Hermione said, “Well, not immediately.” All eyes turned to her and she continued, “I’ve had some practice.”

Safire shook her head, "Apparition wouldn't be safe anyway, not Side Along, not with a semi-willing cargo that’s likely to sprout fang and claw at any moment. It's really too bad we can't fly."

Hermione shuddered. "Only for those who like brooms. Wait, that's it! We are thinking of home. America is ridiculously huge. Brooms _would_ work. Petrificus, then tie them on." She held up her hand and ticked off four fingers in turn, "Eastern, Central, Mountain, Pacific. Three hours from dusk here."

Safire smiled, then sobered. "No. Transformation will break petrificus. And then it will be too late to apparate back.

Sheppard leaned into the conversation. "Trigger a portkey at the far edge of the continent."

Safire countered. "And if he transforms mid air, before we call you back? Will you face a were hundreds of feet in the air, on a broomstick?

There was a moment of silence while Sheppard glared at Safire and Safire glared at the tops of her shoes. Hermione, very quietly said, “Avada is painless.”

Sheppard slammed his hand on the desk, Safire started shouting, and Hermione pulled her arms around herself and went quiet. After a moment, Ducky caught up Safire's hands in his; Pat pulled Sheppard down with a hand to the back of his neck. Tim realized he’d stepped in front of Hermione in a defensive posture. He looked up to see Gibbs watching him.

Into the quiet room, Tim said, "A failsafe is a failsafe. It’s not the plan, it’s a backup."

Abby asked, "Hermione? What's Avada?"

Safire said, "Not an option."

Hermione opened her mouth, closed it, glanced at Tim, looked at her hands, and nodded.

Gibbs stepped in, directing his question to Safire, "Would this give you time?"

"I, I think so, yes," she stuttered.

He turned to Pat and Sheppard, "Can you do this?"

Pat shook his head. "I’m shite on a broom. You need Seekers; I never made the team." He glanced at Sheppard. "Now Dick here,..."

Sheppard shrugged, "Pat and I need to be in place at the clearing anyway to control the were. We need to call in the Ministry now, that or the Council, the Americans and your... ."

Gibbs said, "We told them these three were clear; that's why they let them stay and not join Wolf Company."

Sheppard argued, "So we say the test was faulty."

Hermione raised her voice. "They won’t let us do it. They’ll chain all three as soon as they see them."

Safire patted the air, and said, "Fine, the Ministry is out, but we do need more people. Can you call, well..."

Hermione bit her lower lip and shook her head. "He'd help, I bet, but the Prophet would be right behind him. No, no help from there. But Bill Weasley would, and ... Give me a few hours while you go check the clearing, make sure it'll be what we need."

\---:::---

The file room door was open again, and Abby poked her head in to see Hermione's back and Tim in a corner, failing to slouch nonchalantly. Abby pulled the door barely closed and tapped McGee just to watch him jump. Hermione had her locket enlarged and was leaning into the mirror, grinning. Hermione nodded at Abby, then looked back down into the locket and said, "Gave up on the braid, eh?"

Abby moved to peer over her shoulder at the mirror. Draco had his hair pulled back on top, clearly showing where two inches had been cut short at the scalp from one side. He said, "I was molested by a barn owl at the Emporium and had to shake it out to rebraid it. You should have seen the stares. Half of Diagon Alley is guessing who could possibly have it. So of course, I'm dropping hints to the other half. The only name I've not heard put forth so far is yours. It's an entertaining game." He grinned and looked directly at Abby, "Hello there, lovely. Wanna play Dark versus Light? I'll be the Dark."

Hermione looked back at her. Abby looked up in surprise and said to Hermione, "I thought he was gay."

"I can hear you, you know. And I'm crushed."

Hermione shook her head, but smiled. "He's Draco." She turned back to the mirror, and said, "Thank you for helping."

Draco shrugged. "Packing will be the worst challenge. I normally use mother's cloak, but for this, I suspect it'd draw too much attention, popping about the New World."

Hermione put her hands on her hips in mock affront. "Draco Malfoy, riding a broomstick across a continent with a semi-Dark creature tied to your back is considerably more difficult than packing."

"I agree that for you, it very probably is. I've seen what you consider appropriate travel wear."

She laughed, clearly unoffended. "You never stop. Seriously, though, thanks again. I thought about calling, well, you know, but..."

"I'm prettier than he is; I'd think you'd value me over and above."

"I trust you more. Harry's too public, Ron or Viktor would let me distract them. I need you to finish, even if I fall."

"Ah, there is that. Yes, I suspect I can ignore you for the duration of one idiotically dangerous and altruistic attempt at single handedly defeating the forces of darkness. Even if I find myself working alongside Muggles."

"Muggles are not scarier than werewolves, Draco."

"Were are a known commodity. I know what soup to serve. Muggles are completely out of my ken."

Hermione said, "We are helping people, Draco."

He tutted. "Haven't I taught you yet that's the wrong approach?"

Abby leaned in over Hermione's shoulder and spoke directly to Draco. "You'll be pissing off the Aurors."

Draco laughed, sharp and honest. "Really, Hermione, you could learn something from your friend. I've already said I'll do it. Besides, I’ve put ‘Do something each day that would appall the paterfamilias’ on my daily task list and this should suffice for the better part of a week."

"We are going to go find a suitable site tonight. Home in on me in the morning, okay?" She closed the mirror after he nodded.

Abby slipped out of the closet after Hermione, and announced to the back of her head, "He’s pretty."

"He's too pretty," grumped McGee.

Tony, limping and slinged, walked in, "I thought you liked pretty. Now I know why you’ve spurned...” and was smothered in Abby’s squeals and hugs.

Tim sounded surprised as he said, "They released you?"

Tony shrugged, then winced and resettled the sling. "They think I’m at home."

Abby frowned. "You should be in bed."

Tony grinned loosely at her, "Please, I’m so stoned, the world is soft and fluffy as a down pillow."

Gibbs stepped in. "What the hell are you doing here?"

"Except for him." Tony cringed.

Abby hopped up onto Tony's desk. "They released him!"

Gibbs stood with a pack slung over his shoulder. "How many fingers am I holding up?"

Tony took a moment to stare with narrowed eyes, then answered carefully, "Three, boss."

"Wrong. Go home. Sober up. I need you tomorrow."

Tony shook his head, and sighed, moving around Abby to sit behind his desk.

Abby sat open-mouthed. As the elevator door opened, she said indignantly to Tony, "He was so totally holding up three fingers."

"Yeah, but DiNozzo didn’t know that," Gibbs called. The Aurors slipped into the elevator with him as the door closed.

Hermione walked over to Tony with her wand out. He sighed and held out his good arm as though for a blood draw.

She looked at him, confused. "What are you doing?"

Tony said, "Wondering if my werewolf DVDs are about to get refiled under documentaries."

"Were you bitten?"

"Um, no. I got punched, clawed, kicked, and thrown off a cargo container to fall ten feet to a concrete floor, but I'm pretty sure no tongue was involved."

"If there had been, it would qualify as a date," Ziva added, but she sat on the edge of her own desk facing them and her face showed concern.

"I can check, if you'd like, but I was just going to speed the healing a bit."

"You can do that?" Tony asked.

"I got shot at the park. How do you think I walked away? I spent a lot of time in the hospital wing when I was younger. There are potions that would be more effective, but... I'm here." She tapped Tony's shoulder with the tip of her wand. "Is that better?"

"I'm stoned on Vicodin. It wasn't worse."

"You'll notice a difference in the morning."

Ziva scooped up her backpack. "Come on Tony, I'll drive you home."

"Is your friend serious?" Tim asked as they left.

"About what?" Hermione said.

"Appalling his father, menus for werewolves, anything."

"Yes, yes, and no. When he gets serious, it's pretty obvious. On the other hand, I'm serious too often, I've been told."

"Some people consider that a positive trait."

"I don't know any of those people."

"Now you do," and he smiled.

Abby knew that smile, just as she knew he'd never follow through without a little help. "You know," she started, "with the pack broken up, Hermione's not in any direct danger, but she might want to bunk with one of us tonight anyway. I'd, um, volunteer, but I'm going to be helping Ducky and Dr. Safire all night. Tim, you've got a couch, right?"

Hermione started, "Oh no, I couldn't possibly. I'll just go to a hotel," and Tim just stood there doing his best impression of a stunned carp.

Abby refrained from kicking him in the shins and waved Hermione down. "After all, there might be some risk and Tim really is a trained agent and it's not like you kids need a chaperon and besides," she fixed Tim with a steely glare, "this might give you a chance to talk. About Stuff."

Tim said, "Abby, I don't think ..." and Abby started sharpening her glare until Hermione cleared her throat.

"Actually," Hermione said, "we might discuss, um..."

"Stuff," Abby supplied, and made shooing motions at them until Tim caught the hint and they left. She nodded, pleased with herself, then set off for Ducky's morgue and the adventures in blood work that Dr. Safire had planned.

\---:::---

Tim drove most of the way to his place wondering if the silence in the car was comfortable or strained. It was definitely silence, at any rate. Did she want to stay the night? Did staying the night mean something else? Was he ready for her to stay the night in a stay-the-night way and not just bunking in way? He wondered how quickly he could pick up semaphore and decided to figure out if she was actually single, first, before trying to determine if she was flirting. "So does Harry know about Draco?"

"Oh gods, do they. At one another's throats through school, and they can almost, but not quite, be civil now that ...um...we've all grown up and aren't fighting ah ... anymore. Like kids do. You know."

"Why do I suspect that they'd not write it off as childish hi-jinks?"

"Because Draco was never childish and Harry wouldn't use the word hi-jinks?" She paused, then huffed out a nervous laugh. "Okay, you got me. It wasn't childish and we.... We fought a war, and we weren't all on the same side. And our happy endings weren't as simple as we'd hoped. The obvious enemy, no matter how evil, isn't the _only_ evil and sometimes people are on the wrong side for the right reasons and Draco's...well, Draco's complicated."

"No no, you already used 'complicated' with Harry, you have to pick another word."

"Harry's not complicated. He's so linear it's a wonder his skull curves. Straight line and heaven help anyone in the way. Draco's all twists and turns. Sometimes I think he forgets where he was going in the first place."

"Makes it hard to date either."

"Oh gracious, who would want either of them," she laughed. "I mean, Ginny, of course; she and Harry have been ...wait a minute? What? Who's dating what?"

"Um...you?"

"I'm not dating Harry. Ginny's dating Harry. Actually, Ginny's had the kitchen linens picked out since she was thirteen. Why would you thi-- Oh! I remember. No, when I said Harry was complicated, it was because of the Wolfsbane situation. He had, well, we had a ... I should have been working on the Wolfsbane problem earlier, for someone else, and he's sort of disappointed with me about that."

"He's angry because you are working on a solution?"

"Well no, just that ... Wolfsbane is dangerous. He's not happy with some of my research."

"I am." Tim hit the garage opener. "I'd rather not be furry and drooling, thanks. I'm good with research. Though I can see why he wouldn't want you standing in the line of fire, practically daring the leader of a wolf pack to single combat."

She quit tugging at her backpack and looked at him in shock. "I thought you missed that part."

"I'm a government agent, you know. On the other hand, clearly you had it under control."

"You don't seem upset by it. Calder had to do some fast talking when we sent the Aurors just Skoll and not the whole group. And Harry's going to give me an earful as soon as he finds out what I did."

"I'm okay with Ziva being a better shot than I will ever be. Why would this be different?"

He pulled the key out of the ignition and opened the door, not at all missing that she was staring at him with an undisguised grin. Heh, there were benefits to being uncomplicated. He led the way upstairs.

\---:::---

PFC Garret Jackson woke at two and slipped out of the cheap motel room that Agent Gibbs had put him and Andy in. Andy was a good enough guy, but he snored like a freight train and bitched when he got woken and Gary didn't want to deal with it. He thought about calling his sister, thought about going to church, decided to hit the 24 hour gun range just off base. Either he'd be human in two days and he could call Becky Jo then, or he wouldn't.

He signed in on autopilot, borrowed a loaner weapon, didn't let himself wonder where his issue had gone in the week he'd been missing or why his orders were signed by hand instead of printed. Temporary assignment to NCIS, relo to follow. Either he'd be human, or he'd be part of Wolf company for the rest of his life.

He'd seen enough of the photos, seen enough of Temple and Baker and Skoll to know what was happening, what he would be, if this plan of Gibbs' didn't pan out. He reloaded, sent the target whirring back out to the backstop, tapped his tags, as he always did, and fired, onetwo threefour fivesix seveneight, then the ninth. He pulled the magazine out, switched out to the second, onetwo threefour fivesix. He didn't think about his family, didn't think about fangs or fur, didn't think about monsters or magic or the full moon being an enemy. He just switched out magazines, replaced the target, and fired again.

\---:::---

Draco apparated into what was clearly a sitting room of sorts. He called out, "Hermione! Oh Meddlesome Muggle!" There was a chesterfield before him, with a pillow and blankets crumpled on one end. "Oh, it's a party. You having a sleepover? Didn't get enough of bunking in with years of hols with the Weasel Clan?" The first door he came to led to a kitchen of sorts, all gleaming white and boring; the second opened to a tousled Hermione in bed. "Ah, when you said to home in on you, I rather hoped not to find you in still abed."

Hermione pulled the sheets to her chin and glared. "I walk in on you still in bed on a regular basis."

"First, that's my prerogative as a toff and scurrilous layabout and second, it's at least my own bed. I would ask if you are decent, but I've seen what you sleep in. Oh go on, shed the blankets. Can it be worse than the monkeys?"

"I like flannel," she groused, but she threw the blankets off of herself and swung her feet to the floor.

"Where do you find pyjamas with such art? And does Crookshanks know that you are wearing an anthropomorphized cat with a bow on its head? I would hope he would disapprove."

Yet another door opened and a Muggle and a cloud of steam emerged. Draco watched in undisguised delight as the Muggle, startled, dropped his towel and grabbed at it in haste, then said, "I'll uh. I'll just get dressed in the closet."

Hermione flopped back onto the bed and pulled the pillow over her head to say through it, muffled, "Draco, Tim. Tim, Draco. He's here to help. Honestly."

Tim banged his elbow on the door. Draco poked the pillow, then pulled it up, to find Hermione glaring at him. They listened to Tim lurch about trying to get his trousers fastened.

"Oh come now, you weren't thinking of seducing him anyway."

"I might have been," she said as she stood and rummaged through her pack.

"Not dressed like that you weren't."

"I need a shower before I deal with you." She grabbed a robe and fled to the bathroom, trailing the ties, as the closet door opened and Tim stood in the doorway, wearing trousers and clutching a shirt.

Draco crossed his arms and decided to see what he was dealing with. "Shall we discuss breakfast, your sartorial inadequacies, or the fact that this may very well be the day you die at the hands of people who desperately want to protect you?"

Tim blinked, and answered cautiously, "You make it sound like something common."

Draco shrugged and let him redirect the conversation, "I don't know that I've ever done anything common, but then again the people who wanted to kill me were only expected by society to love and protect me. There was never any personal desire to do so involved."

Tim smirked, a decidedly amateur attempt, and said, "So you've been flipping the finger at society ever since."

Draco decided to give him the point, but countered, "I'm British. It's two fingers."

"Do two fingers insist on tea?"

"No, not at all."

"Coffeemaker's through here."

\---:::---

Abby scrambled at her cell. McGee's number flashed and she answered in haste, "You in?

He answered, "Front door," and she hustled upstairs to be there when they got to the bullpen. Draco was everything she never knew she wanted in a wizard, long hair and sneering, smooth and polished and smelling vaguely of cinnamon and rosemary, holding an honest-to-goodness broomstick with foot pedals on it, dressed for riding in tight pants and a close fitting sweater, a green wool cape with bands of black leather in asymmetrical patterns over it all. She quivered like a spaniel. This was beyond cool!

Draco squinted at the lights in the ceiling above them and Abby peered over the cubicle wall. He spotted her; she waved. He looked to Hermione, but she and Tim were bent over a book. He looked back to her. She waved again. He drawled, "You seem terribly perky for a Gargoyle."

She rounded the corner and stuck out her hand. "It's Goth, actually, but gargoyle is kind of funny and we are so glad you are here."

He shook her hand, their rings clicking, and Abby grinned. He nodded behind Gibbs' desk where Sheppard was positively glowering, and said, "Nice to be welcomed by someone. They aren’t particularly happy to see me."

Dr. Safire fussed. "No, no, really, we’re grateful for all your help."

Draco leaned against Ziva's desk in a pose too languid to be anything but deliberate and said, "Don’t say things like that, you’ll shatter my self esteem. Hermione," he called. "Remind me. Why do I run when you call?"

Hermione didn't look up from her book and answered, "I believe your exact words were 'appall the paterfamilias.' "

Draco nodded somberly. "Ah yes, your sense of humor.” He trailed his hand over the papers on Ziva’s desk, dragging them into disarray. “I’m working alongside the Aurors. Ugh. My father ... ”

Hermione still didn't look up but her tone was sharper. "What’s he going to do, disown you? Or put you in mortal danger to advance his own—"

Draco cut her off. "None of that, you are supposed to be sweetness and light personified; I’m the bitter but dashing villain. Really Granger, can’t you keep it straight?"

She did look up at that and she smiled slowly. “I keep it straight?"

Draco waved her to silence, "Shush you. My image is all I have. Let’s not drag it through the mud." He rolled his eyes at her reaction. "Oh, don’t be sensitive, that’s not what I meant and you know it. Here, I brought you a toy.” He threw a golden ball with silver wings at her. She bobbled catching it, and it flew out of her reach and toward Abby.

Her boots had high enough platforms that she barely had to jump to catch it, and as she handed it carefully, fluttering like a trapped bird against her fingers, to Hermione, she asked, "Did I hurt it?"

"I could only hope," Hermione answered. "They aren’t that delicate." She handed it to Tony, one hand under, one over and spoke to Draco, "I'm on the third broom."

"It's too dangerous," Draco said. She made an exaggerated double take and Draco waved one hand airily. "I could pretend someone else said that, but wait, you're pants on a broom, Granger. I don't care how much you played hide the quaffle with the Weasel, you're not good enough for a multi hour flight at high speed." He looked around and spotted the Marines in the corner, “Those two are the were? Goat's Eyes, Hermione. Either of them could snap you in half in human form, let alone wolf. You wobbling about on a broom with one of those behind you is the best you can come up with? Absolutely not."

Hermione put her hands on her hips and opened her mouth, but Sheppard spoke first, "I agree," he drawled. "Beater, Pride of Portree, three seasons. I'll fly the third."

"That's not the plan," said Hermione.

"Three seasons playing professionally?" asked Draco. "You might outfly me. Probably not, though. Injury?"

"Too much time on the road, mate," offered Pat.

Draco arched his brow. "Hermione, we have a new plan."

"No, no we don't," Hermione sputtered. “I am not going to fight about this with you.”

Gibbs stepped in, “You're right. You won't. Because you just lost."

Hermione protested, “What? But...! You don’t even know what a beater is."

Tony said, “Well, I do, but I don’t think that’s what he meant. Right, shutting up.” Gibbs glanced to Draco, then Sheppard.

Sheppard said, "Adapt to new information. If I'm the better flyer..." he spread his hands.

Hermione crossed her arms. "Fine, I'll be sitting safely by on site waiting for you to Portkey in," she said sharply.

Dr. Safire countered, "Actually, no, you’ll be helping me. We’ll be short on time as it is, and I need someone for _mise en place_."

Draco smiled, "There you go Granger, you can chop." He turned to Ducky and Safire and said, "She's almost adequate at potions. I’m much better, but she is remarkably bad on a broom, so it's best she stay here to help you."

Hermione grumbled,”I’m torn between being grateful for your help and wishing I’d never met you.”

Draco flashed a real smile, then affected an air of nonchalance. “I’ve been told I inspire strong emotions in the _hoi polloi_.”

Hermione shot him a look no one needed to interpret. He just grinned.

A bell rang, and Hermione dropped her wand into her hand, the aurors and, Abby noted, Draco doing so almost as quickly. A pop sounded, and a man appeared, rubbing the top of his head. "Ow," he said. "Hermione, what the...?"

"Sorry, sorry!" she cried and hurried to him. "I opened the wards enough for you specifically, but I didn't want to bring them too far down. Here, hold still." She waved her wand at him and the others relaxed. He shook his head sharply and they stepped toward the group. He looked like a wizard fighter to Abby, a fantasy warrior out of central casting for some B-grade movie with CGI dragons. His hair was pulled back into a ponytail, a fang of some sort dangled from one ear, and scars covered his face.

Hermione handled introductions in a few words, too low for Abby to catch and the newcomer nodded to each in turn until he came to Draco.

"Weasley," Draco sneered.

"Malfoy," the new guy snarled.

"Oh honestly, both of you." Hermione said, her hands on her hips. Draco shrugged and examined his fingernails while Weasley turned to her.

"Old habits. Here, I borrowed a Mother Hen. Mum never could get us to use them."

"Oh wonderful!" Hermione clapped her hands. "I need to thank her; this is better than I dared hope for."

"She'd really like to hear from you," he said quietly, and Hermione flushed.

"I thought..." she started.

He snorted. "You don't get away from the rest of us that easily," he said as he pulled her into a rough hug.

She grinned up at him shyly, then turned to Gibbs.

"This is a mother hen set. They're portkeys," she explained, then bit her lower lip. "Which means absolutely nothing to you. I'll keep the big one with me, and each of the riders will take one of the smaller ones. When I break this one," she waved it, "the others are called home to it." She handed the smaller sticks to Weasley and Sheppard then pointed to each of the Marines in turn. "Bill, you have Jackson; Auror Sheppard, you have Tucker." She eyed the broom in Bill's hand and the men. "There is the question of basic physics."

Pat grinned and took a scarred leather bag from his coat pocket. He unsnapped it and reached inside, withdrawing a superfancy broom with leather straps and more pedals than the one Draco carried. Abby believed that broom could fly. "Happy Christmas, Richard." He tossed the broom to his partner, with a grin at Hermione. "Nice work, that one."

"The new Nimbus?" Sheppard's eyes gleamed. "Back soon."

"Ye'd better."

Hermione nodded. "Tim, you're with Draco," she said as she handed over another of the sticks.

"So, it's like that, is it?" Draco drawled.

"Draco, you are impossible, just pretend he’s …oh I don’t know, someone you want to take care of.”

He reached out, took the Snitch from Tony's hand and pressed it into hers, then leaned in and very slowly kissed her on the cheek. “The Bonnie Beater over there just did that for me.” He brightened and straightened, tugging her hair. “Remember to chop, not mince. Use the silver knife on the snail's tails."

\---:::---

Abby pulled into the parking lot between Gibb's Charger and Ducky's van. The clouds that had concealed the full moon had covered over the rest of the sky and the initial downpour had slowed to a fine rain that soaked everything. She squelched through the mud, following the sound of Tony bitching, and stopped before she got to the clearing to call softly.

"Hey, guys? With trigger fingers and um, stick fingers? Don't shoot. It's me."

Pat appeared next to her as though he floated out of the tree she had one hand on. "We know. Come along."

The clearing was lit with glowing mushrooms at the edge, and Safire sat crosslegged under a folded canvas tarp held by Ducky, with an umbrella in his other hand at one corner. At the other corners were Bard and Tony, both with no umbrella and the clingiest wet pants ever to incite lust in the heart of forensic scientists.

"Hi! I got it." She slid her backpack to the ground and pulled out the small packs from the herbalist's shop. "Aconitum napellus, Sorbus aucuparia, and Viscum album." Safire looked at her blankly. Abby repeated, "Monk's Hood, Mountain Ash, and Mistletoe." Ducky sneezed and the whole tarp shivered. "Ducky, you want me to take that corner?" She dropped the packs into Safire's lap.

"Thank you, Abby, yes. This weather is frightful."

Dr. Safire could take lessons from Madame Firefall downtown, Abby thought. No stage presence at all, with notes spread around her in a wide swatch of paper that was, interestingly enough, completely not wet, despite the trickle of rain running off the corner of the canvas where it was drooping just a bit. But the three hole punched, college ruled paper was covered in what had to be Hermione's handwriting and Abby worried for a moment, gnawing on the thumbnail of her free hand, about McGee and flying broomsticks. The canvas shifted, so she corrected and glared at Tony, who had moved to shake his wet trousers down. They didn't shake, though, spattered with mud at the hem and clinging up across his thighs. The edge of fabric where his pockets were was clear in the odd blue light of the mushrooms circling them and Ducky probably hadn't appreciated the view nearly enough. Boxer briefs, eh? She'd known what style underwear Tony favored, everyone did, but a glance as he was hastily changing wasn't anything like this, this near nudity, with the outline of his briefs cutting across his thighs, cupping other parts. She changed hands, conveniently shifting enough to put her weight on her other leg and see down the other edge of the triangle, since she could take a gander at Tony's legs every other Saturday, but Auror Bard was new and certainly worth looking at as well. His jacket was heavier than Tony's dress shirt, and his pants were darker than the khakis Tony was wearing, but they were just as wet, and pressed just as close to his butt, his thighs, his calves. Wet canvas was sexier than even leather, she thought, and didn't bother to hide the grin.

He caught her eye and grinned back. He pitched his voice to carry through the rain without disturbing the others. "All I can say is that it's a damn shame that Dick's out there, because if ever there was a man made to stand in the rain and look stoic, it'd be him."

Abby said,”I'm sure he's fine."

Tony grumbled, "I'm sure he's dry."

Gibbs handed something to Safire, who looked up, her eyes distant, and said, "Ah, Agent Gibbs, thank you, yes. We are very close now."

Gibbs replied, "We'd better be. They're about to run out of continent." He checked his watch.

Hermione was crosslegged, sitting in the mud, feeding chopped bits of things to Safire, both of them chanting. Hermione's hair was frizzy in the rain. The cauldron belched and Safire pulled it off the coals, pouring it without splashing into a coffee mug with the Marine logo on it. "I've got it. Bring them home, and gentlemen..." She looked at Pat, then at Gibbs.

Gibbs said in his command voice, "Abby, Ducky, take the tarp and move away."

Abby stepped back and saw but couldn't hear Hermione break the stick. Then everything came too fast to register.

Draco popped in with Tim; Pat grabbed him and yanked Draco out of the circle toward Abby. Draco stumbled and was hit from behind by Bill, also propelled by Pat. They all went down in a tumble. Abby could see under Draco's elbow as Tim start to transform.

His arms stretched, then popped free of the skin, glistening with blood and rain. The skin pulled free as his wrist grew, darkening and lengthening and sprouting hair to cover backward bent new joints. He shuddered and the skin over his spine split and for a selfish second, she was glad she couldn't see his face. She ducked back under Draco's cloak as Draco rolled to cover her, pressing her into the mud and blocking her view. Tim screamed, Abby retched, and Sheppard landed hard on his back in front of them, his fancy broom spinning to the side, knocking her further into the mud.

One of the Marines screamed, then growled. Somebody drove a pointy body part into her ribs. She decided to stay in the mud as the men on top of her struggled off one another to their feet. She rolled to sitting and looked past their legs as Tony shot each man, now monsters, shaggy and yowling at the sky, with the big tranquilizer rifle while Hermione and Bard stood and chanted and covered all of them in a blue glow that swept them up, and trapped them in nothing more than light. All three were inches above the ground, feet drumming against the mud in what looked like a grand mal with fangs, their skin still bubbling, bones popping, eyes rolling. Safire stepped in far too close to the snapping jaws and threw the potion she'd been brewing over all three of them.

Abby realized she couldn't tell which one was Tim.

The screaming became growling became silence, but Gibbs still stood over them with his service weapon out. Tony stood across from him with the tranq rifle held ready. Abby stood behind Gibbs, careful not to come too close and said, "Isn't that a bit of overkill? The blue glowy seems to be working."

Gibbs said, "I've decided I don’t trust chopsticks as a weapon."

Abby answered, "Don't let Ziva hear you say that. She's got Tim convinced she killed a man in Beijing with nothing but a MooGooGai Pan and a bottle of water."

She walked over to where Sheppard was standing and poked him in the chest. "Is that painful?"

"Aye, you've got bony fingers," he grabbed her wrist and she pointed at the blue glow. He released her and rolled his eyes, saying, "and no, it doesn't hurt them, or at least not as much as a needle in his flank must do." He raised his voice to include Gibbs and Tony. "We had them."

Tony spoke up, "Call it backup."

Sheppard answered, "Only if I had any faith in your chemicals."

Safire shot them an injured look over the tops of her glasses, and Hermione rose from where she'd been examining the three were, now silent and motionless. "You needn't trust either, now. Look. It works." She sat cross-legged right in the mud and stroked the shoulder and back of the one nearest her. He shuddered and shrank, pulling inward as the fur covering him shed in time-lapse, falling out in clumps to soak in the still falling rain. "How long will the tranquilizers stay in effect?"

"Long enough to get them into the van and some clothes," Gibbs replied, and Abby averted her eyes.

Magic was nice, she decided. Now that Safire wasn't brewing, Hermione and Pat covered them all with an invisible giant umbrella. Abby watched the rain puddle and pool on the transparent roof above her. After a few minutes, Tim came out of the van, his eyes still slightly glazed from the tranquilizer but otherwise looking like himself again. He hitched at the waistband of the sweats they'd brought and she reached out to pat him, an involuntary reassurance to herself and him of his shape, his familiar height, his skin. He patted her hand with his own trembling one. "The other fellow's already taken off, but if you want to say bye to Hermione's friend, now's the time."

"You gonna be okay?" she asked.

"I'm not running any marathons, but I think I can sit here by myself while you go talk to people," he answered. "Shoo. Go make eyes at the romance novel cover."

She grinned and hopped to where Hermione and Draco stood a bit away from the others, their heads together.

He saw her coming and smiled brightly. "Then this is your chance," he said, and turned to Abby as Hermione turned to face her as well. "So, you've come to give thanks to the hero of the day, then?"

"Yep," Abby said. "Hermione really did a job on all this, didn't she?"

"Wounded!" he lamented. "Wounded, ignored, and unappreciated!" Abby stuck her tongue out at him, while Hermione just smiled. "I was going to offer you a place in my home. Let you be my pet, but now, I'll return to cold manor walls and an ashen hearth, alone and heartbroken."

"All right, that's enough." Hermione turned to Abby and said, "Quit encouraging him," and they both ignored Draco snickering behind her. "And you! Oh, I don't even know what to say to you, Manor Lord."

"I do." Abby held her arms out and stepped up to Draco to pull him into a hug. "Thank you for everything."

He patted her awkwardly, and when she stepped back, he seemed honestly nonplussed. "Um, you are quite welcome, actually." He glanced at Hermione, who was staring at them both with wide eyes and her mouth open. "Yes, well," he continued, "On that note, I'll take my leave." He bowed formally to them both, stepped over his broomstick, and zipped into the night sky.

Abby turned to Hermione who had her hand over her mouth. Abby asked, "Are you laughing?"

"Not yet, though I may eventually. You hugged him."

"I hug everybody."

"He doesn't." Hermione shook her head and continued, "Hang on, before you go anywhere, I need you to listen to me. I could use your help, both now and later. Are you willing to give it?"

"Of course," Abby answered.

"No, I mean this. The Ministry will come in to clean up. You need to convince them that you've forgotten all of this, that you never learned of Magic or .... or anything."

The penny dropped. "You're talking about that memory erasing that you did the day Tim got chomped."

"Yes, only more so. So it's up to you. Do you want to forget about all of this, or are you willing to break the rules and help me?"

Abby smiled.

\---:::---

Gibbs had started to wonder, when Calder was waiting in reception to thank them for their help and asking them round to the nearest pub for a celebratory drink. He nursed his beer, and watched Safire watch Ducky play darts with Sheppard and Bard. Tony and the two Marines were talking quietly at the bar. The others had begged off, and if Gibbs had noticed McGee watching Granger, well, that wasn't his to speculate. Good agents didn't speculate. Neither did good bosses. Rule twelve wasn't at risk.

But watching wasn't speculating, so when Auror Bard had a private chat with each of the Marines, he noticed, but when Bard followed Tony to the head, Gibbs gave them a moment, then followed. The bathroom was empty, and they were standing near the fire exit. The red light lit Bard from below, distorting his face. Gibbs walked up, carefully careless. Bard had Tony against a wall and was whispering intently into his ear as Tony looked stunned or post-coital.

"Should I give you two a moment?" Gibbs asked.

Bard kept DiNozzo trapped, or maybe supported, with a forearm across his chest, and turned to face Gibbs. Their eyes met, and Gibbs was pretty sure he wouldn't remember a thing about the special talents of their new friends in the morning.

Bard shook his head; Gibbs figured the end of his wand was in his hand. Bard said, "Obliviate would be quicker but I thought you'd not appreciate having to reteach them to tie their shoes."

Gibbs blinked. "Stand down. I figured you would have a way to keep yourselves hidden. Remember, I saw the EMT. Can't say I wouldn't like to have something of the sort. Just not used on me."

"It's security protocol. What you don’t remember can’t hurt us. Or you. I'm sorry."

"Is this where I wave my clearance around?" asked Gibbs.

Bard shook his head, regretful but resolved. "The risk isn't to me, but to my whole society. It’s not my call. Where's Dick?"

"Playing darts, waiting for your turn," Gibbs answered.

Bard turned back to DiNozzo, whispered again, then caught him as he slumped. "Whoa there, boyo," Bard said, too cheerfully. "Might want to stick with beer for a bit, 'til you get your feet back under you."

"Heh, uh, yeah," DiNozzo peered at both of them suspiciously, not drunkenly at all. Gibbs nodded at him and DiNozzo wandered back up to the bar, shoving himself onto the stool beside Safire and stealing her bottle of water. Sheppard looked up, nodded at Bard, then at Gibbs, who raised his nearly empty beer in acknowledgement.

DiNozzo was deep in conversation with Ducky, and a narrow line between Safire's eyes seemed to relax. The two Marines made their excuses and left, uncomfortable around strangers and civilians. Sheppard came over to buy another round and leaned onto the wall near Gibbs.

Gibbs looked intently at him and asked, "Ziva and Abby?"

"We can catch them tonight."

"Be careful of Ziva; she’s a light sleeper and a quick trigger. I'd hate to have to go through all of this a second time."

"Thank you, Special Agent Gibbs. You could have made this very difficult. It's been a pleasure working with you."

Gibbs nodded, and replied, "Do it." He drank his beer slowly, warm in the feeling of a case solved.  
\---:::---

Abby yawned and Hermione looked up from her modified laptop with a worried glance. Abby waved, "It's just been a long couple of days. It's been fun, you know, meeting you, well, except for the bit about lycanthropy and Tim and well, you know... stuff..."

Hermione grinned, packed up a big wooden box into a smaller metal box and lifted that like a bento. "I'll be out of your hair, at least for a while, soon." She held up a thin blue string and said, "Last chance to tell me to go away."

"Yeah, like that's gonna happen." Abby stuck her finger out and Hermione bent over it to tie the string into a bow. "So, I remember and no one else does?"

"Mostly. Sort of." Hermione scratched her nose. "We can't erase the deaths, but I'm going in with Tim to modify the data where I can and set up triggers at Auror Calder's request. If anyone goes digging too hard without the codes I gave you, he should show up."

"What about our special project?"

"Separate files. You and I are off the books."

"Now for the really important question," Abby started and couldn't help grinning as Hermione cringed. "You going over to McGee's next?"

"Yes."

"You should jump him, Hermione."

"Abby!"

"He really likes you, you know."

"I really like him, too."

"Hermione, he... you... You may have to make the first move."

"I beg your pardon?"

"You know, tell him what you want."

Hermione gaped at her. "You Americans are so forthright."

"You going to mindwhammy him?"

"No," Hermione answered. She pulled at her hands for a moment. "And I'm not even going to pretend it's for the research."

"Won’t that get you in trouble?”

"I’ve decided I don’t want him to forget me.” She took a steadying breath. "I've been in trouble before."

Abby nodded, and Hermione hugged her, impulsively. "Thank you."

"Go be a hero."

Hermione disappeared with a pop, and Abby went home, not overly surprised to meet Pat in the hallway. She put on her best Listening to Ducky Yammer on About Stuff face as he Latin-ed at her, then agreed cheerfully with everything he said and sent him on his way with a jaunty wave.

Then, she pulled Hermione's blue string off her finger.

\---:::---

Tim walked through his living room in sweatpants and a tee shirt, not the stiff, new, institutional grey and black they'd had for him in the van, after, but his own, worn to a whisper and not entirely modest on a cool day. The living room was chilly after the prolonged heat of the shower and he stretched, feeling each muscle in its right place, each bone sliding in accustomed ways and a pop sounded from the bedroom behind him. He pulled his weapon from the table and eased open the door to find Hermione standing at the foot of his bed, her hands full.

"Um," she said. The feather she had tucked behind her ear drooped.

Tim stepped forward, setting his gun on the bed. "Here, let me help you."

"Right." The black duffel swung forward and hit him in the scrape on his shin and he cringed and he tried to take it, pulling something sharp cornered and hard into his ribs. He dropped the duffel to the floor and elbowed the box to his nightstand, then faced her, waiting. "Um, so..."

She licked her lips, "Right, I was... I mean, I am... I need to clear some files. Of yours. I mean. NCIS's. And yours, obviously."

Clear files, he thought. Erase memory. "The EMT at the park. This is why you don't exist. You clean up after any contact."

She twisted her hands, "Yes. But ... I...." She lunged and kissed him, catching his lower lip between their teeth pretty much right where he (the wolf) had slammed it open on a rock on the ground hours before. It bled sluggishly and she looked horrified. She whipped out her wand and he flinched away from it, still raw, and she muttered, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry."

"What are you doing?" He put his hands up.

"Apparently, assaulting you with my lips. I'm so sorry."

"Why?" Was this a frog prince thing? The cure took, didn't it take?

"Because ... because you listened, because you believed in me, because it worked, because your friends love you, because you look at me with hope and without hero worship, because you don't care what I've done, so long as I got it right, because when you smile at me, I smile back, because I've been sleeping alone so long, because I want to and I thought you did, but you didn't push me last night when I balked, because ...

"I thought the pajamas were a signal." It's not like he expected garter belts and fishnets, exactly, but flannel wasn't his preferred seduction wardrobe.

"They were, oh, and they weren't, and I don't know. Because you are funny, and hopeful and clever by far and because I want to kiss you. Abby said I should tell you what I want."

"Oh." So much for overt signals. "You want to kiss me?"

"I'd also rather like to be terribly bold and not wear my pajamas in your bed tonight."

"Oh."

"So? Um, this is where you say something."

"I have a better idea." He couldn't keep from smiling as he stepped close and leaned down to kiss her, gently but with intent. It must be colder in here than he'd thought; she shivered under his hands. "How about I not say anything at all and just agree with you, because quite honestly, that’s been working pretty well for me so far."

She smiled up at him, and he reached down for the sidearm. She looked up at him, puzzled. He hefted it, the weight of the gun, still, after years, unfamiliar in his palm. "Monsters." He put the gun on the nightstand.

"No monsters here," she said and placed her palms against his chest, her shirt pulling up as she stroked up to curl her hands behind his neck and draw his lips to hers again. Their kisses grew heated, and Tim unbuttoned her blouse, following the path of his fingers with soft kisses, until her breath came faster.

Returning the favor, she stripped off Tim's shirt and gasped.

"Scratches, mostly." he shrugged.

"I can fix that." She pushed him onto the bed, and laid her wand against his split lip. He felt a chill, then a flicker of something, and she followed it with a kiss. Again, with the jagged scratch across his left bicep, the faded bruise on his shoulder, following each with a kiss, some soft, some open. She pulled off his sweat pants, and trailed a series of small kisses along the tingle that had been the long scrape along his shin, but the abrasion on his right hip got a lingering kiss and she sucked and he groaned. She laughed, silently, her breath huffing over the damp spot she'd made.

"You were right." He grinned. "I'm safe in your hands." She rolled her eyes.

Tim went to his knees and stroked off her jeans, revealing soft, alabaster skin. Hermione seemed almost fragile against his hands and he stroked under her ribs, along her breasts, until she was bare.

"No pajamas."

She shook her head, and pulled him down, with a soft "Oh!" as he entered her.

She shuddered under him, her throat open to his mouth as she panted and he pressed kisses into her neck and let himself fall into his own climax.

"I don't suppose you could let me keep this?" he asked, propped up on one elbow, combing through her curls.

"Mmm?" she curled up over his other arm. "My hair? It's only useful as an ingredient, not in itself."

"No, this memory. You came here to sterilize the files, right? My laptop, my memory, my brain. I'd like to remember you."

"Oh, um, that's. I want to remember you, too. I mean, I don't want you to not remember me. Erm. But I do need to clean the files and can you keep a secret?"

"Yes. It's what I do, Hermione. Can you be my secret?"

"You can't keep me. I've got...responsibilities."

"Your research. I get it."

"You do, don't you?"

There was a story there that Tim would want to know eventually, but not now. "Around here, saying, 'Classified job' either gets you a nod and understanding or it gets you a false number. Reality of life."

"The Ministry, the council, too, they demand secrecy. For very good, very real reasons. I really don't like breaking rules. I don't."

"But..." Tim grinned.

"Oh, you are impossible. Fine, yes, I'm going to wipe your files, but ..."

"But not me."

She shook her head. "But you can't tell anyone. Except Abby. I need her for my research."

"Abby's the only one who would believe me and wait... research? I'm research?"

"Not unless you want to be. I was ...oh! No, no no, that's not what I meant."

"So what, then?"

"I want to see you smile when I come to visit her, and I want that smile to be for this. For me. If you don't mind."

He kissed her soundly. "I'll keep your secret."

\---:::---

Gibbs carried his coffee up with him to Vance's office. He had a reputation to maintain, after all. He was unsurprised to find Calder wearing an outfit out of a John Ford movie, sitting in the chair in front of Vance's desk, and even less surprised when Vance shooed them both out with instructions for Gibbs and his team to turn over all materials for their case to the FBI. No one checked Calder's badge this time.

He stood to the side and let his team do their jobs, David and DiNozzo pulling two boxes of physical evidence, Ducky bringing up his notes, McGee tapping away on his machine. He overheard DiNozzo ask McGee about his apparent easy acquiescence, but they both shut up when they saw him. Better for everyone that way. Though Tim mentioned in front of Vance that their specialist on loan was returning to her work at BAE and Gibbs spared him a momentary smile, before he caught Abby staring at him in speculation.

Gibbs sent Tony and Ziva out with Calder and turned to McGee. “That’s the physical files. You already cleared your private electronic files?”

“Yeah, Hermione and I were backing those up elsewhere last night.” Then he blushed. “Um, they didn’t mindwipe you?”

“They did. Didn’t take.” Which meant they didn't know about R2I training or the SERE course.

“Good. I may, um, some of Abby’s equipment may get used for not strictly NCIS purposes. I can cover our tracks, but…”

“I’ve got signature authority.” Gibbs nodded.

McGee added, "Um, Abby and I are, well, and you, obviously.... What about Vance? Or Tony or Ziva?"

"What about us, Probie?" Tony called.

McGee fluttered and Gibbs stepped in. "Just talking about the case, DiNozzo. What did you think of our friends? Little odd?"

DiNozzo threw himself into his desk chair. "No odder than Ducky, though I'll admit, boss, that pub of theirs doesn't water their liquor."

"You've just been going to the wrong kinds of places," David interjected. "Fern bars are for yummies." She leaned back and eyed him and McGee. "I agree with Gibbs. They were odd, though Agent Calder was particularly...memorable." She winked at McGee and smiled, then busied herself with files. "I suppose they must think the same of us." She smiled enigmatically, McGee looked to him, and Gibbs just leaned back and smiled.

"Cultural differences, Ziva. We've all seen stranger things than that."

**Author's Note:**

> Some time ago, [](http://jenna-thorn.dreamwidth.org/profile)[**jenna_thorn**](http://jenna-thorn.dreamwidth.org/) and I were tossing around a virtual football of ideas that turned into this story, _Stranger Things_ , a crossover between J.K. Rowling's universe, and NCIS. When we had told all the story we had to tell, the opportunity to submit the piece to the Hermione Big Bang came up, and we did that. Of course, that meant polishing and finishing and the hell of dialog tags and transitions and the actual heart-stopping moment of hitting "send". It was a learning experience, a labor of love, and the opportunity to meet the other half of my brain. I would never have finished this alone, would have thrown up my hands in disgust and thrown it in the bottom drawer with the other unfinished projects. Thank you, my beautiful enabler, for poking and prodding me. Most of all, thank you for putting up with me, and being the best writing partner I can imagine having.
> 
> In the course of participation, we had the incredible luck to have some really awesome art created for our story. I would like to publicly thank [](http://www.dreamwidth.org/profile?user=tbranch)[**tbranch**](http://www.dreamwidth.org/profile?user=tbranch) , [](http://mamabasto.dreamwidth.org/profile)[**mamabasto**](http://mamabasto.dreamwidth.org/) and [](http://www.dreamwidth.org/profile?user=goodsally)[**goodsally**](http://www.dreamwidth.org/profile?user=goodsally) , and *squee* all over again about the pretty they made.
> 
> Of course our betas were instrumental in helping wrangle the story into readable form. I am so grateful for your help.


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